


The Eradication of Japanese Knotweed on the Camino de Santiago de Compostela

by owlbsurfinbird



Category: Lewis (TV)
Genre: Angst and Humor, Angst with a Happy Ending, Asexuality, Camino Santiago, Canon-Typical Violence, Dwelling on Canon Violence, Intense Romantic Longing, Introspection, Journey, Multi, One Night Stand, Quest for Healing, Small Fandom Big Bang
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-16
Updated: 2015-04-16
Packaged: 2018-03-23 00:02:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 45,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3748108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owlbsurfinbird/pseuds/owlbsurfinbird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All in all, it's a pleasant end to his walk on the Camino. </p><p>With the exception of being arrested for murder, of course.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Profound and heartfelt thanks to my beta-reader, Wendymr, who was at my side for every painful step of this journey. This story was very dark and became much lighter and happier with her guidance. I've tinkered with it since, so any resulting errors are mine. 
> 
> Thanks to the exceptionally talented untldeathtakeme for the wonderful song list and header art: http://archiveofourown.org/works/3741055. 
> 
> Written for Small Fandom Big Bang Round Four.
> 
> The story takes place between the end of Season Seven and the beginning of Season Eight. Pay attention to the section headings as they go from past to present.

**Oxford—Present**

“New look for you since you’ve been back. Dark suit and tie. Bit dour.”

Hathaway stood at his desk, searching for a file. “Didn’t want to outshine your choice of neckwear. Has Laura been selecting your ties?”

“Something wrong with them?”

“Didn’t know she fancied purples.” Pauses. “I used to have a pink tie.”

“Used to have? What happened?”

“Seemed—frivolous.”

“James. What happened on your Spanish not-a-pilgrimage?”

A furrow deepens between Hathaway’s eyes as he considers the question. His jaw works, his lips press firmly together.

“Nothing I care to talk about yet.” He touches Robbie’s shoulder. “We can sort it over a pint on Friday, yeah?”

James's black coat swirls like a cassock as he leaves the office they now share.

Lizzie glances up from a stack of case files. “Can’t see him in a pink tie.”

“Pink tie, yellow shirt, pale grey suit.” Robbie smiles fondly. “Lavender socks.”

Her eyes widen.

“Oh, yeah,” Robbie muses, watching Hathaway leave the main office. “Something happened on the way to Santiago.”

**Oxford—Past—A Few Weeks After Walking the Camino**

_Fallopia japonica_ , Japanese knotweed, is classified as an invasive species. Its deep root system can lift boulders, can cripple roads. It completely crowds out all other species. It takes root in poor soil that has lain fallow for years. Once it has taken root, it can be impossible to eradicate. And when cut back—with slow, deliberate care and careful disposal of shoots and leaves—it remains. The plant may not appear to flower and grow though it remains buried in the earth.

Many a gardener has shed a tear trying to cut back Japanese knotweed. The stalks, when cut, are razor sharp.

James thinks of Robbie when he thinks of Japanese knotweed. It’s not just the hours he’s spent helping on the allotment.

It’s much more than that.

His feelings for the man are no longer on the surface—they have been cut back in another attempt to keep them from flourishing. But the roots run deep.

He took a long walk to forget. And yet the roots remain.

It’s not bindweed. It’s Japanese knotweed.

He doesn’t know useful information, he tells Phillippa Garwood, as she hacks away in her garden, trying to distract herself from her husband’s murder.

But he knows Japanese knotweed.

It will not die easily.

It has heart-shaped leaves.

**France—Camino Frances—St. Jean—Past**

In France, he prepares to walk. He’s been on the Way of St. James before as a religious pilgrim, during the year of the Jubilee, the summer before he entered the seminary. Thirteen years ago. His _credencial_ was stamped all along the Jacobean way; his _compostela_ is rolled in a tube in the back of a file box in his flat with other memorabilia of those years.

This time, he does not wear the shell insignia of a pilgrim. He does not travel with postulants. He does not carry a marked staff or a gourd or even a bible. He decides to walk for personal reasons, filling in the paperwork to do so.

When he walked the Camino the last time, he was surrounded by others who thought the same way he did. He walked in joy, suffused with light.

Every night for the last two weeks, sitting in the darkness or in the dim light of a hostel, he misses his guitar, stashed safe inside Robbie’s flat.

He tests out a new solar charger for his mobile, ringing Robbie before he leaves from St. Jean, ostensibly to ask him about the allotment.

Knotweed has a lovely tiny white flower, James tells him. It seems to be everywhere, James tells him. I miss my guitar, James tells him.

He is dismayed to learn that Robbie will have to move his instrument from its safe spot against the wall in the guest room. Robbie is moving.

Robbie and Laura are moving in together. No great surprise there. Expected it, really. Still.

It’s an older place, Robbie says. I’ll put your baby in the back seat of me car, Robbie says. It will be fine, Robbie says.

There is something magical and otherworldly about the cadence of the conversation, James realizes. The sequence of threes. Sitting outside a café smoking a cigarette, about to embark on what should be a holy quest, he is betrayed three times by promises of fealty.

It’s not the first time he has compared himself to Christ. Probably won’t be the last.

The telephone conversation ends with Laura shouting for Robbie to help bring in the shopping. He’s cooking again, he explains. James hears her laughter as she shouts, "At least, that’s what he calls it. I call it 'burning.'" She laughs.

Robbie chuckles, ringing off without waiting for James to say "goodbye."

**Oxford—Present**

"Orange juice?"

"Seems if you’re going to tell me about your trip, the least I could do is listen with a clear head."

"A clearer head is the last thing I need." James takes a deep drink of beer, sets his glass deliberately on the table, and wonders where to begin. "Your neighbor walked the Camino?"

"Made it to the cathedral. Big tourist attraction, apparently."

James nods. "People journey with the end in mind. For me, it was the walk. I walked part of the Camino before I entered the seminary. One hundred kilometers. It was simple." His lips twist into an ironic smile. "The traditional length is 500 miles starting from St. Jean. I told you I needed a change. What I needed—" He pauses to make sure he is understood. "—was to be transformed."

"Neighbor said she was transformed into a walking advert for paracetamol."

James nods. "From St. Jean to Burgos, you learn that nothing can prepare you for the walk. I’m fit. My pack only weighed 38 pounds—but it chafed for the first three weeks. Good trail shoes gave me blisters."

"Sounds punishing."

James quirks an eyebrow thoughtfully, sips his beer. "It was appropriate."

**France—Camino Frances—St. Jean-Pied-de-Port—Roncevalles—Past**

Like other pilgrims, he gets his hair cut before he leaves St. Jean—the queue is long. From inside the shop he watches the barber pole spinning lazily outside a smudged window and listens to the buzz of a shaver.

All pilgrims get the same haircut, the barber tells him. The penitent man has his head shaved to rid himself of pride and arrogance, the barber tells him. It is an act of humility, a _mannat_ , a promise to God, the barber tells him.

I'm getting it shaved so my hat will fit better, James tells him.

When the barber shows him his likeness in a mirror, he wonders what happened to that sweet-faced young man he once was. The man in the mirror looks hard, worn. Like someone awaiting a sentence. _A criminal._

He feels it's oddly fitting.

He gets a late start out of St. Jean, confident that he will reach Roncesvalles before nightfall.

He does not.

The climb is steep as it crosses the Pyrenees through a leafy beech wood on a carpet of leaves.

Chasing after suspects through the streets of Oxford has not prepared him for tackling the hills. Years of smoking have taken their toll. He stops frequently to breathe, to cough.

The two weeks spent strolling through French vineyards sampling wines on his way to St. Jean was hardly sufficient physical preparation, he admits to himself. It probably wasn't wise to maintain heroic levels of inebriation to get himself through, but it was an emotional necessity.

Best way to avoid entanglements in Oxford was to leave suddenly.

He would have gone to Spain straightaway, but the bulls were running in Pamplona.

He's seen enough bloodshed. Given the choice between getting drunk and running with the bulls and simply getting drunk, he chose getting drunk.

He doesn't want to die, he tells himself. He's just not too keen on living right now.

Not after what he's done.

And failed to do.

The list of accounts are long on both sides of the ledger, and, on balance, it's a poor performance overall. He's not used to getting less than top marks. These internal negative accounts of his personal performance grate on him like a shovel hitting a rock.

On the emotional side, it doesn't start with what happened at the allotment, though he can't keep the analogies of earth, rock, plant, water and every bit of transcendentalist verse out of his brain. _Bloody hell, I've become a garden manual._ But it doesn't start then.

Though it probably started with flowers. Orchids. Carried home from the Virgin Islands and laid at a grave years before.

On the intellectual side, it didn't start with any of the deaths that he and Robbie have investigated, though it will certainly end with Adam Tibbitt's death.

Because he can't do this anymore, he tells Robbie. There are no analogies, no verse, nothing except the sum total of wretchedness to describe how he feels.

Over the years, when the work became too much, he and Robbie would sort it.

But there never seemed to be a way of sorting the tangle of feelings he had for Robbie and they've only grown worse since Robbie and Laura finally got together.

He has always imagined himself to be much like the knight of woeful countenance: able to love pure and chaste from afar. Because although he loved Robbie, he had never imagined making love to Robbie. Not once. He couldn't imagine making love to anyone, really, though he had, a few times, because he cared enough to want to please them.

Sex was an intellectual curiosity at best.

So it was heady, this brief, unfamiliar sensation of desire for Robbie all of a sudden. Passion. Or what he imagines as desire or passion. It seems small compared to the reams of poetry and literature devoted to it. Not a fire, not a flame. A spark? Perhaps. He doesn't have a personal comparison. It's different for each individual, he knows, but he can't bring himself to be grateful experiencing this sensation at this point in his life. It feels intrusive, wrong, and has a destructive potential that outweighs any benefit.

He looks up at the mountains he will cross over the next few days. He rubs his knees, feeling miserable about every single bloody fucking thing in his life at the moment.

The Stella Drew case shattered him into the pieces he is now trying to pull together.

He knows now his feelings for Lewis were affecting his judgment. Knows he was feeling bereft, angry, jealous. And hurt.

He had expected to feel a little hurt once Robbie and Laura got together. He loved the man, after all.

The disconnect between the expectation of pain and the maelstrom of real anguish was something else again. It was a point of pride for him: he believed—truly believed—that because he didn't feel physically attracted to Robbie, he wouldn't feel hurt.

Certainly his love for the man was great enough, deep enough, encompassing enough, pure enough: Robbie's happiness would be his happiness. It would be enough, James thought, just to work at his side and be with him every day. He wasn't seeking martyrdom in this, he simply thought he was being realistic.

He believes he should be able to love Robbie enough to see him happy with Laura. No reason not to.

When his normal resilience became brittle—as did his temper—he failed to bounce back. Unable to focus properly, unable to control his frustration, unable to contain himself. He knows this now.

From his vantage point just off the Camino, his gaze follows a peregrine falcon lazily spiraling down on air currents.

_That's how I feel,_ he thinks. _Going down._

And he can't tell Robbie that he feels partially responsible because he was distracted. He's not supposed to be distracted by anything. James holds himself to a higher standard. So is he tormented by this feeling of guilt over Adam's death because he actually feels responsible? Or is he tormenting himself with guilt over Adam's death because he feels guilty about something else?

_There's no problem so awful, that you can't add some guilt and make it even worse._

He wonders if Adam Tibbitt would still be alive if he hadn't tried to make him understand his need for an alibi. If he hadn't pushed him into admitting that he spent the night crying in his girlfriend Rachel's arms. Hadn't shouted at a kid who had been pushed beyond his limits by family, college, and God knows what else.

He wonders. Again, it is that disconnect between reason and emotion. He could not have known. But he feels that he should have known.

_Poor kid. His father shook my hand, and there's the man who should have known. The man who is truly to blame._ The teachers, too—all of them from Stella Drew to her husband the tutor to the dean of the college himself—all were culpable in his eyes.

Homicide has a wide circle of collateral damage. There are too many victims for him to recall each one now, and this troubles him, too, his inability to remember these lost lives.

Collapse of compassion—his "churchy friends" talked of nothing else in Kosovo. How horrible it is to lose your capacity to care because you can't minister to all those who require assistance. How devastating it is to see whole families destroyed on a daily basis.

And none of this—not a single thing he did then or now or will ever do—can bring back Adam or Vicky or Briony or any of the kids he's seen in SOCO photos over the last eight years. _Those photos should have been school portraits._

He had dropped to his knees in the church when the case closed. Had asked God for guidance. Had begged to be heard.

_God isn't listening,_ James thinks.

_And neither am I._

So here in the Pyrenees, he sits on a rock, listens to the wind in the trees, and the footsteps of other pilgrims as they pass his solitary post. He opens his pack, and pops a dry paracetamol, hoping the bitterness it will awaken him and lessen his hangover.

He won't be able to drink like he has been while crossing the plains of Castile.


	2. Chapter 2

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

"Earth to James." Laura taps on the doorjamb. She comes into the office he shares with Lewis— _no, Robbie_ —it’s Robbie now that James is planning to leave the police force. Now, after so many years of Sir and Lewis.

 _Robbie,_ he reminds himself.

As if he can forget.

Laura smiles hesitantly, perhaps not feeling welcome? Not his intention. He wants Robbie to be happy. Wants her to be happy, for that matter. Everyone should be happy. Except him. He doesn't deserve happiness. Not today, anyway—it's too soon for that.

Adam's father had thanked him. Thanked him for what he did. He can't seem to let go of that man's hand in his mind.

_God, I might as well have tied the knot myself. Or perhaps joined the queue behind the father or teacher to do so._

He forces himself to meet her eyes, attempts a pleasant mien.

Finds his wretched heart softening in the kindness of her gaze.

"James?" Laura cocks her head. "I came to see if you were still planning on helping Robbie with the allotment tomorrow." At his nod, she continues, "It's his back. He won't admit that it's been bothering him and I don't want him to hurt himself."

James manages a rueful smile, huffs a laugh, understanding. "Yeah, he hates admitting he can no longer shovel his body weight in compost."

"There's a delightful image, the two of you wallowing in manure." She smiles merrily at him. "I have a PM in the morning, but I'd like to make you both lunch at my place after. Soup? Fresh bread and beer?"

"Can I bring something?"

"Just bring the two of you home in one piece. Don't do my best work out in the field." She grins, tapping her fingers against the jamb, a rapid tattoo, as she leaves.

**Oxford—Present**

Robbie gestures with his orange juice toward another table. "Fried calamari. They're getting fancy here. Pretty soon you won't be able to get fish and chips."

James rolls his eyes. " _Chipirones_ —baby squid in its own ink with cinnamon and garlic." He sees Robbie's interest and shrugs. "Great the first time. Gets old fast." He drinks his pint. " _Tapas_ bars. Cafes." He smiles slightly. "I looked forward to eating in the _albergues_. Lentil soups and meat stews. At least they'd usually allow you to help cook for everyone."

Robbie raises his eyebrows. "Sounds like that would be up your street."

James nods, amused. "Thirty to forty _peregrinos_ in various stages of hunger and sleep deprivation—oh, yeah, it was just like public school." He settles his elbows on the table. "Everyone pitches in at mealtime, setting up tables, washing up. Talking about the journey over a glass of wine. Or not. You sleep in ancient dormitories—in bunk beds, if you're lucky. Mats on the floor, if you're not. And you are inches away from a stranger—old, young, men, women. Snorers— _roncador_."

"You should be used to that."

James barks a laugh. "Kipping on your couch was hardly adequate preparation for that cacophony."

"You made new friends."

James considers this, almost shaking his head. He didn't. Well, maybe one. But he doesn't want Robbie to feel sorry for him, doesn't want him to know how hard it is for him to connect with someone else. It would make Robbie feel as if he has to do something to correct a situation that James has lived with all his life. James makes a non-committal noise.

**Spain—Camino Frances—Roncevalles—Burgeute—Pamplona—Past**

The mountain vistas are stunning. He stops often to appreciate them, taking photos with his mobile, taking time to catch his breath. It's a warm, cloudless day. Stands of trees line the wide dirt path at first then thin to nothing except steep grassy hills.

He hears American pilgrims talking excitedly of seeing the Capilla de Sancti Spiritus, the Silo of Carlomagno—maybe Roland was buried there! And giants! It's an ossuary!

James lights a cigarette, thinks about the last time he saw an ossuary. A modern one. And the killer they finally caught.

 _You wouldn't be excited if you actually saw those bones with flesh on them,_ he thinks sourly.

At Roncevalles, he joins 80 other pilgrims at a Mass celebrated in honor of surviving the first stage of the journey. In the Augustinian _refugio_ , official signs beneath clocks list mealtimes, bedtimes, expected chores, the costs for a triple bunk in a dormitory hall. Pilgrims eat elbow to elbow promptly at 19.00, lights out at 22.00.

People who snore are asked to sleep at one end of the hall. Because James arrives late, he spends the night listening to music on his iPhone at high volume, trying to sleep despite the snores above and below him.

 _Laura jokes that Robbie snores,_ James thinks. _Never heard him. Never more than a snuffle kipping on the couch. Would give anything to hear that snuffle right now._

Everyone is booted out the next morning at 08.00.

It is this horde that descends on Burgeute in the morning. Hemingway used the fishing town as a base for Jake and Bill in _The Sun Also Rises._ The houses have steep red tile roofs and wide grey stone borders around their windows: the large red wooden shutters snap shut at the sight of those walking the Camino Frances.

He can't blame the townspeople. The pilgrims are pillaging the enchanted forests and thickets of Basque country. They buy long thin loaves of bread and leave bits of crust for the birds near the Rio Arga along with their trash and toilet paper. Leafy trees line the steep ascents, the clay soil is slippery.

His feet hurt.

A magnesite factory in Zubiri spews smoke into the green mountains, the noise drowning out all coherent thought. As early as the 16th century the water was known to be toxic because of the minerals there; _peregrinos_ were encouraged to drink ale or wine. The Traveler's Fountain is dry.

He's grateful the countryside is quite different from Oxford. It's the mountains, for one thing. At first, if he passed a glade, he would think of a lifeless hand protruding from the earth. But now he no longer has a vision of half a man protruding from a pile of leaves. No, he sees trees, twigs. The natural decay and rot of a forest floor without any unpleasant additions.

The descent is steep, but wooden trestles pounded into the hills make the descent easier on his knees. Navarre is quite pleasant, really, James thinks, as long as you don't drink the water.

And until one reaches Pamplona.

The old Spanish city is not a haven for pilgrims. The 14th Century Pilgrim's Kitchen no longer ministers to the _peregrinos_. The people of Pamplona live for the fiestas of San Fermin and _encierros,_ the running of the bulls in mid-July. They love the wild challenge, the blood, the tourists willing to pay anything for a piece of the action. He is grateful to have missed the carnage of a week before.

He's seen too much blood.

_See how the droplets are smaller there on the ceiling, Robbie said. Comes from swinging the weapon high and fast—blow like that no wonder there's so much blood, Robbie said. Hathaway, watch your feet there, Robbie said._

_I'm going to be sick, James said._

_This job will change you, Robbie said._

James sits on a bench in the city, accesses the internet with his iPhone, a satellite giving him his precise location, advising him of local café specials for _comida,_ the big meal in mid-afternoon, the specials in the _tapas_ bars later that night. The sun doesn't set till very late; he has time to see the Basilica of Ignacio de Loyola where the founder of the Jesuits was wounded. Or he can swipe through the photos here on the web. Save himself the trouble of walking. Or thinking.

So he's managed to miss the running of the bulls, managed to miss the International Celtic Music Festival in Ortigueira, and managed to miss a video conference training seminar on directly accessing the US CODIS fingerprint database.

He deletes these items from his calendar.

He hasn't managed not to miss Robbie.

Robbie cannot be deleted.

He had passed a bookstore where faded English copies of _The Da Vinci Code_ were displayed proudly in a dusty window, as if trotted out for the tourists in the previous weeks. Robbie was reading the book at Laura's urging to "prepare" for their holiday in Italy. _Probably a joke,_ he thinks.

James takes a quick glance at his mobile which tells him he could stop, too, to see the Centre for Opus Dei, a mysterious cabal within the Catholic Church, at least in Dan Brown's mind. Could indulge in Knights Templar fantasies and mystical symbolism along the Camino.

"The Way is a game," an Italian had told him that morning. "The Knights Templar played out in city names and ancient monuments—The Game of the Goose. There's a tomb in the center—it's the Santiago de Compostela. The goose at the goal is Finisterre. The _pata de la oca_ is the sign of the goose foot—see on its side how it looks likes the scallop shell? There's an app for it. It shows the telluric current—the psychic energy currents that will spiritually transform you as you walk."

James fights down a sudden urge to ring Robbie. Wanting to joke about running with the bulls, the two of them. "Just like running with the dons and cycling students at Trinity. Ole!" Wants to tell him that he's become a New Age mystic. "Just like chasing the goose that laid the golden egg. You can join me and we'll have a fry-up when we reach Finisterre."

He finds a cheap hotel for the night, drops off his pack, and goes to the quiet café next door rather than the _tapas_ bars down the street. He orders a good red wine and _ensalada mixta:_ mixed greens with white asparagus, tuna, olives, onions, garlic and pimento in fragrant olive oil. He taps the ingredients into a list on his mobile, planning to share the recipe with Laura, thinking that the olive oil would be good for Robbie's heart. _He won't mind the veg as long as the tuna is tasty,_ he notes, putting this information in an email.

He doesn't press "Send."

He stares at his iPhone and then sighs heavily, tapping its edge against his lip. He's been gone less than three weeks. He can't stop thinking about Robbie—or Laura—and it's only been three weeks. Three miserable weeks. And he hasn't really begun the journey, not yet. Pamplona is the only the third stage, according to the electronic guide. He has weeks of this yet.

In the Middle Ages, they walked without maps. Took forever.

Maybe that's the point.

He has another glass of wine. Reads the news on his mobile. Silently practices his Spanish on DuoLingo—understanding some of what is written and spoken. Has another glass of wine. Plays "Bejeweled." All while taking up table space, getting drunk, and ignoring the dirty looks of the café owner who seems to want him to leave.

It's obvious that James is not a tourist. Why isn't he out at the tapas bars, getting drunk and looking for trouble, the café proprietor asks the server. Stupid pilgrim.

James gets up, a bit unsteady. "I leave," he says in slurred Spanish.

"You speak like an infant," the café proprietor tells him in English. "Buen Camino."

**Oxford—Present**

"Laura's got me learning Italian for our holiday," Lewis says. "Thought I'd take that translator gadget, but she says it's outdated. 'Course, you probably speak Spanish."

 _"Un poco ahora."_ James cocks his head. "Makes a difference if you know the language when you travel. But there are many languages spoken on the Way. English, Spanish, French, Italian, German. Galician."

"But no Latin," Robbie jokes.

"Conversational Latin is only spoken in Oxford."

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

“ _Fallopia japonica_. Bit of Latin for you. That’s Japanese knotweed. Oh, aye, it's not bindweed." The head gardener in charge of the allotment crouches, digging into the soil with his hand. He pulls up a fist-sized tangled taproot and then another. _"Deus omnes ad infernum condemnare,_ as the old don says. Gotta call the authorities."

"Is this a police matter?" James jokes, inhaling. He flicks ash from his cigarette.

"This is serious." Robbie gives the shovel a disgusted dig further into the dirt. "Invasive species. Have to treat the soil. Dig it out."

"Aye. Have to use a tarp, haul away the roots. Bloody paperwork." The head gardener trudges back to the shed that serves as an office for the allotment area.

James surveys the turned soil. Deep furrows, clods. Mud in places, dry in others. A cluster of tiny pale rocks. All morning they’ve been pulling surface plants and root balls from the previous tenant gardener. He finishes his cigarette, putting it in the container near the water bottles and tools.

He has just swung a pickaxe when Robbie loses his balance mid-dig and falls into him. There is a clatter of sharp tools and expletives. Both men topple to the ground.

"Robbie. Are you all right?"

Robbie is on top of him. Head against his chest. Shaking.

James grabs Robbie’s upper arms. "Robbie? Robbie!"

Robbie looks up from James's chest, silent laughter dissolving into a fond smile. "Three weeks trying to get you to call me 'Robbie' and all it takes is a tumble."

James lets his head drop back into the dirt. Relieved that Robbie isn’t injured. "Yeah." He wants to say more, doesn’t dare. The early morning sky is a milky grey on a chilly summer day, the ground beneath him is damp and cold from the recent rain. Robbie is warm against him, pressed chest to belly to shin.

The soil is rich here. And his heart is a seed--new growth protected by a hard coat.

A child’s memory surfaces. Soaking and scoring hard seeds. His mother and his aunt planning to make a bower of twine and bamboo stalks overgrown with deep blue morning glory vines.

Your own place to play in summertime, his mum said. A place to dream, his aunt said. Stuff and nonsense, his father said.

Robbie hasn’t moved.

James reluctantly releases Robbie's arm. He cranes his head, and puts a hand behind it to better look at his former guvnor. It is a minute—less, really—but it feels longer.

Growing.

Tendrils reach, pulling taunt across his chest. The morning glory had flowers that were deeper blue than Robbie’s eyes. James remembers sitting in the cool dark beneath the bower as a child and staring up at the spaces between the leaves and flowers to a pale blue sky.

Robbie’s eyes are the color of that sky.

"Nice and warm here." Robbie grins, his hand curled beneath his chin. His fist rests on James's chest. He reaches, with the other hand, to James's forehead. "Got a bit of…"

James closes his eyes, barely breathing. A breeze fluttering morning glory leaves and flowers. Robbie brushes his forehead with his fingertips. An instant. Then it is gone.

 _It's only a moment,_ James thinks. _He'll spend the rest of his life with Laura, can't I have this moment with him?_

James opens his eyes, his heart pounding wildly. He half expects Robbie to leap up in alarm, but he doesn’t. He smiles at James with affection. As if he would ruffle his hair. Or call him clever clogs. Or remind him that Laura is home making lunch for the two of them.

It is a different kind of love than what James feels for Robbie.

It makes him swallow hard, this realization. He knew it all along, of course. But he hoped. He continues to hope. Will always hope.

Continues to believe that something will grow.

_No. It can't._

Then—as he's done for years—he pulls these thoughts away, chaff and weeds. It takes a bit more effort, though, because the roots are deeper now, more tenacious.

And then, there's a tingle that disappears in the space of a heartbeat.

He forces himself to smile at the man lying on top of him. A gentle smile. Accepting what is offered because that is all that will be offered. His heart is in his throat, choking off what he longs to say because he believes it will destroy everything between them: it must be his imagination. Instead, he says: "You’re not a lightweight."

"Not usually on top." Robbie gives him a cheeky grin as he pushes off him.

James stands up, brushing off mud and dirt, thinking of that evanescent thrill. "I think I need to take a walk."

"I think you need to take a bath."

"That too," James admits.


	3. Chapter 3

**_Fallopia japonica_ Notebook**

**_…With the emphasis on "ongoing" remediation: it can be anywhere from three to five years until a property can be officially declared knotweed-free. And re-contamination can happen all too easily. Even the tiniest bit of leftover root can cause regrowth, which means that digging up knotweed is not so much a matter of making a hole, as it is of carrying out a large-scale excavation._**

**_Chemical eradication is often the first line of defense. —Gardener's Guide to Invasive Plants_**

**Spain—Camino Frances—Cizur Menor—Stella—Aygui—Irache—Past**

On the way up the hill to Alto del Perdon, he passes a fountain where, according to legend, the traveler could obtain water at the price of selling his soul to the devil.

This fountain is dry, too.

He imagines that the figures cut from sheet metal at the top are the actual pilgrims who made the bargain and that the huge wind farm on the hill is blowing their souls to heaven: "The way of the wind crosses that of the stars."

The rusted metal cutouts rattle in the wind.

There are no shade trees now, just vineyards, wind and dust. And pilgrims walking in groups. He imagines he is the weak one to be culled from the herd, walking alone, left to the demons of Navarre.

The remains of the Roman road make for an uncomfortable walk. His feet ache and he barely notices the view into Estella: the churches, the monastery. He sees the magnificent cloister of San Pedro, the church of San Miguel—it feels empty because it isn't shared. He doesn't take any photos there.

No, he takes a photo of the Devil's Marker—Santiago 666 km. between Estella and Ayegui because he is reminded again of how far he is from God, from forgiveness.

From Robbie.

He stops and consults Google. He is 1495 km from home. From Robbie and Laura and—everything.

And the fountain of Irache will get rid of that feeling of desolation. Here, the fountain not only has water, but wine, too, from the local vineyards.

He doesn't have to offer his soul: it's free wine on tap in the middle of nowhere. He fills his water bottle with wine, toasts the unseen watchers on the web cam mounted on the tap. Thinks about changing the direction of his journey so that he doesn't have to pass churches or people. Thinks about taking a different Camino, one without wind farms or metal pilgrims or wine fountains. Thinks again he may have to give up wine once he reaches Leon.

His father drank to excess. James thinks he has his own drinking under control.

Or at least he did, until recently.

\+ + + +

Spain has a proud tradition of hosteling its religious pilgrims. As one on a spiritual or personal journey, however, he is not eligible to stay in low cost _albergues_ unless there is room. Summer is high season. James expects that he will be like a small number of others camping in the rough along the way.

In Irache that night, he carefully pitches his tent away from others on the grassy hillocks. The old stone _albergue_ is full; the surrounding area is roped off for camping. His tent is a tiny cylinder compared to three mushroom tents at the far end of the field.

The instant James hears the screams at daybreak, he struggles out of his sleeping bag, copper’s instincts taking over even while asleep. He rushes out of his too small tent, long limbs tangling in rip stop nylon and plastic tent poles and trips, landing hard on his knees. Scanning the scene expecting to see bodies strewn across the field, he sees he is the only one injured. Everyone else seems to be fine, vocalizing their growth from spiritual seedling to mighty oak, arms upraised in the rosy dawn.

Screaming and shrieking.

He sits, cross-legged, in front of the ruin of his tent. He rubs his knees. Watches the world around him waking up. Thoughtfully lights a cigarette.

Overnight, he has become one of what must be hundreds camping in the rough along the Camino Frances to Santiago. Three mushroom tents have become interlocking fairy rings. The number of people making their way to the cathedral has tripled since his last journey. The Camino has become trendy. Pilgrims all around him yawn, fuss, fart, piss, and scream.

The screams are an exercise in a best-selling book called _The Pilgrimage_ , about a man finding his way to Santiago de Compostela. As part of a spiritual exercise, the hero is told to imagine he is a seed springing from the soil and struggling toward the light, vocalizing his emergence.

James had abruptly decided to walk based on his previous experience on the Camino. He needed to resurrect his younger self: one who believed people were inherently good, one who was secure in his faith in God.

One who was innocent.

Now, though, there are so many pilgrims. _Should have done more thorough research,_ James chastises himself. _Or a bit of research, at any rate._

Decided to leave Oxford rather suddenly, too.

But the Way has changed. He has changed.

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

Having knotweed at the allotment is serious enough to warrant unplanned hours of heavy labor digging out the roots. James pushes himself into a sweat, using exertion to short out his overactive brain. He pulls out every root, yanks every bit of plant matter from the plot of land with perfectionistic zeal. He shovels in compost, worm casings, chicken manure; he hoes and rakes. It's far too long before he notices that his former boss is using a shovel to hold himself upright.

After going home to clean up, James stops to buy a bottle of wine before going to Laura's for what is now an early supper. Robbie is already there, he guesses, since he plans on "overnighting" again.

James wishes they would move in together. Get married. Make it final. Permanent. Irrevocable. There's a hesitancy in Robbie, though, in his devotion to Laura. _Why doesn't he buy her a ring,_ James wonders. _They've known each other for years and now that they are together, what's keeping Robbie from making the commitment? What's keeping her? Not a single bloody thing holding them back that I can see. Though I'm on the outside looking in._

He parks his car outside Laura's, tightens his hands on the steering wheel, and pounds his forehead gently against his hands before he straightens. He lets his breath out in a frustrated puff. His thoughts and feelings are as muddy as that patch of land in the allotment.

For one thing, he feels bloody awful for not noticing that Robbie was pushing himself to the point of injury out there. And for another, he's wondering why he wasn't noticing, when he was always completely in tune before.

_Was I ignoring him because I couldn't face what happened out there when we fell? What was that moment out there on the ground with Robbie?_

He's been close to the man for years and he's never had trouble hiding the depth of his feelings before. Always able to cloak them in sarcasm or poetry or other diversionary tactics.

Up until the last few months, it had been almost perfect.

Before Robbie, he cultivated an air of aloof discipline around the nick. Quiet and shy was perceived as snooty and cold and he could live with that. He wasn't there to make friends, after all, he was there to do a job. If you are thought of as unfeeling, you can't be hurt. Though of course, you do feel everything. Every cruel taunt, every slight. Every blow.

And then Robbie comes into his life and…well. Suddenly winter fields thaw, spring is in his heart growing wild. James blossoms. He's composing ballads, buying lavender socks for his too-long feet, wearing his bleeding heart on a too-long sleeve. He's happy. All of his preconceived notions are drop-kicked out the door.

Robbie Lewis. Still grieving for his beloved wife. Kind, older man with youthful spirit. Straight.

James Hathaway. Grieving for something he's never had. Kind, younger man with an older man's outlook. Straight? Gay? Bi? Pan?

Well. James is not a sexual person, never has been, and that is what is so idyllic about this situation: he's not expected to be.

On one hand—initially—it delights him to see that, yes, he is capable of loving someone. He reads poetry with a new sense of recognition and appreciation. His love is platonic and sweetly romantic. He can write a sonnet over the chance meeting of their eyes over a pint. He is restored to calm equilibrium when their shoulders brush as they sit together waiting to interview a suspect. He is incandescent when he hears the words, "Takeaway at mine, Hathaway. We're going to go through the case files again and see what we've missed."

On the other hand—over time—the rush of feeling seems to crush him. Realism versus idealism. He kicks himself for being a romantic because he is more intelligent than that. Too many murder suicides, too many love affairs gone wrong, too many people in emotional pain—he feels as if he's seen it all and it never ends.

James sees Robbie, too, trying to figure out why he doesn't have anyone else. So James joins a band. He tries to follow well-meaning advice to "get out more" and "find a partner" and all the while, he is trying to hide his feelings in plain sight. No one can possibly think his depth of feeling is real if he is making light of it in public.

Because it is the job, too. Over the years his feelings for Robbie have grown tangled up in how he feels about work. He tells Robbie that he doesn't like what he has become. Doesn't like the idea of working without Robbie's gentle reassurance. Doesn't like the pressure he's getting from all sides to study for OSPRE.

He's studied for OSPRE before—don't they know that? How did they think Fiona managed to pass the damn thing? Fast track, yes, but he tutored her. In exchange, she tutored him—their supposed "clandestine office romance."

He was a recalcitrant pupil.

And when he had finally mentioned it to Robbie after her farewell do—"we've been wondering how I'd break up with you"—the man urged him not to do what ifs. Jokingly offering him eighty quid in front of Fiona's flat either to get a full-body massage or say goodbye properly.

He shakes his head, his mouth a tight bitter line. He pinches his bottom lip, notices, and drops his hand to his lap. _What was that all about, anyway?_ Taking the money, returning twenty to lay in the pints and then keeping his guvnor waiting for almost an hour.

_Weird moment in our friendship, that was, knowing he was waiting at a pub while I was saying goodbye to Fiona._

Robbie was into his second beer by the time James showed up at the pub, flustered and embarrassed.

Because James had been tempted, very tempted, to leave that sixty quid on the bedside table to put paid to the whole idea of Fiona McKendrick and what she meant to him.

But he couldn't.

Oh, he is capable of sex, attentive in that he wants to please his partner even if he's not pleased himself. He's even summoned up the effort on rare occasions to take the initiative trying to learn more about himself. _Is it me? Her? Him? Them? If I practiced more on my own—called a sex line or read Loaded or watched male porn online—would that ignite feelings in me that everyone else seems to have? Is there a book on this? A journal article? And if I believed I loved the person, would that matter?_

And he does love Robbie. But he isn't sexually attracted to him—at least, he hasn't been in the past. Not as if he ever dreams of jumping into bed with him.

Except to cuddle.

He huffs a soft laugh at himself and stares at Laura's flat. _Wonder how that would go over? "Robbie, do you think Laura would mind if you and I overnighted? Takeaway, telly, and a snuggle on the couch? Kissing? Just that—nothing more."_

_I could be wrong though…_

_…An instant at the allotment where I imagined there was more than affection in your eyes and I felt something I didn't think I was really wired to feel. Bit alarming, that. Frightening, almost. Thought I had come to grips with who I am a very long time ago. Terrifically bad timing for things to change now especially when I don't understand completely what has happened to cause it._

_Shit._

He rests his head on the steering wheel.

He's been hiding the true depth of his feelings for so long, publicly ridiculing the idea of any kind of relationship with anyone—other than Robbie—for ages that he's begun to believe it himself. Casual co-workers assume he's bisexual, acquaintances assume he's gay, his few friends make no assumptions at all: they've been watching the drama of the "better half" for years wondering what to make of it and him.

His duty—as he saw it then—was to make sure that Robbie's unfortunate taste in women didn't extend beyond casual drinks, a dinner date, and a good night kiss. He wanted to like the person Robbie would eventually choose. Encouraging Robbie and Laura to get together had been his way of making sure he liked Robbie's "Hobson's Choice."

Laura could give Robbie—everything. At least, that's what James told himself. Laura was secure in her sense of self, her profession, her outlook on life. She was bright, funny, and she adored Robbie. She wanted Robbie, but she didn't need him; like as not she wouldn't feel threatened by James, who only wanted to love Robbie too, as a dear, true friend.

At least that's how he thought it would be until today when it all went spectacularly to shit at the allotment when he felt—not even sure what to call it.

He tightens his fingers along the steering wheel again, suppressing an urge to wrench it loose in frustration and takes a deep, cleansing breath, counting as he exhales.

He consoles himself by humming a few bars of a Lennon tune as he goes to the Laura's door: "You've Got To Hide Your Love Away."

_Perfect._

Robbie greets him. The man has showered, shaved, and is wearing an old shirt that James would call his favorite if he's allowed to have an opinion. Blue, soft. The color of his eyes.

 _God, he needs to rein this in or— maybe go with it._ "Not suave. Fetching, though. Matches your eyes."

Robbie makes a face. "Not trying to appeal to you."

"You don't know what you're missing," James quips, going into the kitchen so he won't have to see Robbie's reaction.

Laura glances up, smiles, distracted from grating cheese. "No teasing before dinner, James."

Her small table is set for three. James is reminded again that he's the odd man out. He sets the wine on the table. "It smells delicious. Anything I can do to help?"

"Might open that," Robbie says, joining them. The kitchen is small; he maneuvers James into the doorway so that he can work beside Laura. "Let me finish that, pet."

James stands in the doorway. Laura has put on music. The table looks lovely, inviting. The two of them are adorable, standing almost shoulder to shoulder at the counter, feeding each other bits of bread and cheese.

James plasters a smile on his face to hide the fact that his heart is breaking because he feels excluded, immature, and foolish all in one go. _I've always wanted you both to be happy. Is it too much to ask that I should be happy too?_


	4. Chapter 4

**Spain—Camino Frances—Past**

There are some who make the journey in the traditional cap decorated with scallop shells and a cape to ward off evil. They talk of "finding" their walking stick along the Way as if it will be imbued with mystical powers.

Most, though, are like him: REI mail order hiking trousers in a quick drying synthetic fabric, with zips at the knees and Velcro pockets. Earbuds and iPhones loaded with the latest Santiago apps: a GPS for all of the traditional routes and variants based on interests in art history, archeology, Catholicism, spiritual quests, literature. One American app even rates the toilets along the Way.

Their rucksacks are carefully balanced with aluminium and padding to distribute the load: clever micro-cooking gear, down sleeping bags, inflatable sleeping mats. In addition to this gear, he carries a fiberglass collapsible walking stick precisely matched to his height.

It does not escape his notice that the expedited shipping costs for these items is more than many people earn in a day. He tries not to think about that. Tries not to think of a great many things.

The vestiges of his previous life—his mobile and a solar device to charge it—are safely hidden within his rucksack. He has a Spanish dictionary and a copy of _Don Quixote_ in Spanish—both in paperback, rather than digital format. He's practicing his rudimentary Spanish using his mobile. He imagines he’ll be fairly fluent in the language by the time he finishes his journey.

He has never lacked for hubris, he admits to himself.

His rucksack weighs 38 pounds, a little over one-fifth of his body weight. Normal to a bit heavy by Camino standards. Still, he's fit, in shape from chasing the criminal element all over Oxford. He wore the rucksack during his trip to Kosovo, so he’s surprised when a strap begins to chafe along his side. When he stopped to buy padded straps in St. Jean, the man at the small camping equipment shop told him in French to buy two.

People who chafe at the side have partnership issues, the man said. People who chafe at the shoulder have responsibility issues, the man said. I can tell you what problems you have by where you chafe, the man said.

James had given him a tolerant half smile. "What about people who don’t chafe?"

"They don’t walk the Camino," the man answered.

James refused the man’s offer to get something for blisters. He will not get blisters. He’s done this before. His shoes are broken in, cushioned. Expensive. He walks every day for work. He’s walked the Camino before. Blisters are unthinkable.

You will need something for blisters, the man insisted, as James left the shop with his padded straps.

Hours later James is sitting on a cairn at the side of the road when he takes off his shoes to stare at his raw, inflamed feet. In Oxford, he rarely noticed his feet except to match his socks to a shirt or a tie. Lavender socks, lavender tie. Pale yellow tie, pale yellow socks.

These socks are moisture wicking, quick drying hiking socks designed for optimum performance. His feet should be in ideal shape, not tender. One blister is forming at the back of his heel. The blister on the edge of his little toe is filled with blood.

He stares at his toe.

Toes and toe tags. The image is unwanted. The incongruous cardboard tag dangling from the big toe identifying the body. Pale, greyish cast to the feet. Dead young women who paint their toenails bright red or pale blue. The way a large toe tag looks on the foot of a child.

The little Zelinsky girl had childish pink painted toenails.

He remembers breaking down, alone at first in the morgue, head in his hands. Remembers the warm touch of Laura Hobson, rubbing his shoulder, not looking at him, not intruding. Just there for a moment in shared grief and understanding, and then gone.

_So many tiny feet and toe tags since then._

A group of Hungarian pilgrims stop, seeing and misinterpreting his distress. There is no common language between them except exaggerated hand waving and clucking at the state of his feet. He is given a needle and they show him how to sterilize it with his cigarette lighter. He pops the blister. They give him a few Elastoplast strips and wave away his offer to pay for them.

He offers them a pack of cigarettes, which they take with thanks.

He remembers then that, even if he never gets another blister on the journey, he must carry supplies to minister to a stranger. And he must carry extra cigarettes for barter.

Thinking of others before himself was once integral to his being. When had that changed?

**_Fallopia japonica_ Notebook**

**_The common English name “knotweed” displays …a lack of respect (and ignorance) in itself…use the Japanese name: itadori. A literal translation of itadori would be pain puller or, removes pain. A name that clearly tells us something about the uses of the plant and the high regard in which it is held. Plant people of Japan, Korea and China have traditionally used the roots of itadori as an anti-inflammatory, a laxative, for oral hygiene and cardiovascular health … it is particularly good for the heart. —From Shikigami, Where The Wild Things Are_ **

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

"She used every bloody pan in the whole kitchen," Robbie grouses, brandishing a tea towel.

"I heard that," Laura calls from the other room as she sets up the board for Scrabble.

"Laura went to a great deal of trouble to make _paella._ An accomplishment, considering she doesn't own the right type of pan." James plunges his hands into hot soapy water. "It's not a simple dish and I, for one, appreciate her culinary efforts."

"Thank you, James!"

James smirks at Robbie.

"Brown noser," mutters Robbie.

"I want dessert. There's pie in the offing." He hands a clean pot to Robbie. He watches as the other man wipes it dry to set it on the counter.

James indicates the bottom cupboard with a tilt of his jaw. "If you don't put that away, we won't have room for the other pans."

Robbie bends at the waist to comply and inhales sharply. "Dammit," he hisses.

"Robbie?" James lays a warm, wet hand on the small of Robbie's back.

"Christ, that feels good." Robbie straightens with difficulty and reaches back, pressing James's hand into place. "Right there. Can you rub right there? That's the ticket."

James inhales and holds his breath. He presses into the shirt fabric covering warm, knotted flesh. "I'm getting your shirt wet." He lifts the edge of Robbie's shirt, working with one hand, his other arm supporting the man in a half-hug.

His forehead drops to Robbie's shoulder as he massages. Their bodies are close, so close. Intimate, but not.

Robbie moans softly in pleasure as the pain eases.

James bites his lip, trying not to think about how hearing that small release from suffering affects him. There's an instant of—something. A frisson. A possibility. A disorienting lurch of reality. He concentrates on remembering a passage in Latin, something about a march.

_This cannot—must not—be happening._

He can't think of anything except the man in his arms.

His heart is swelling— _thank God nothing else is_ —and there's a fraction of a second where—no, it has to be his imagination—

"Robbie? James? What's happened?" Laura says with concern, though there's a wary edge to her voice as she takes in the scene from the kitchen doorway.

 _Shit,_ thinks James.

"It's my back, that’s all." Robbie pulls away from James. "Trying to put away a pot."

The loss of contact, of warmth, is bracing, sudden, and cold. James frowns involuntarily at Laura before he can hide his hurt that she will be the one comforting Robbie, not him.

_Shit, shit, shit. Not what you think. Christ, it is not what you think, Laura._

_But, oh, it is what I wanted. Just to hold him in my arms, nothing more than that._

_At least, I don't think there was anything more than that. I don't even know anymore. I don't even think I truly knew I wanted this much._

She moves beside Robbie as James steps aside. She doesn't look at him. Her attention is fixed on Robbie.

James sighs. "I'll finish washing up."

"Thanks." Laura smiles at him ruefully. "Hate to make you the maid, but I do appreciate it." She guides Robbie into the living room, the two of them moving gingerly. "Here."

From his spot in front of the sink, James hears Robbie complaining about her fussing, complaining about having to sit in a hard chair, complaining about his damn back.

James dries the last of the pots, leaving them on the counter. Composes his features into something resembling an apologetic expression as he goes into the living room. He expects Laura to urge him to stay for dessert. Expects Robbie to cajole him into watching a gardening show on telly.

He does not expect the feeling of desolation that wells up as Robbie looks at him, though. Seeing Robbie's pained expression, he realizes then that he must leave immediately. "I'd best be going."

"Yes, that might be best," says Laura, coming back into the living room with a heating pad. Her demeanor is one of ownership—as if he has deliberately broken the man and she is left to put him back together again.

 _Maybe I did break something and it has nothing to do with his back._ There's always been an unspoken trust between them: no expression of heart-felt emotions, no stirring speeches of undying love, no skin to skin touching. Light and sarky, shoulder to shoulder—that's how they manage.

_Not lying on top of each other in the dirt, his fingertips brushing my forehead. Not massaging a knot from his back with my palm and standing to one side as if I'm hiding a hard on._

_Was there always something there between us and I'm noticing only now?_

_Guilt, embarrassment, remorse, anger—yep. All present._ James chews the inside of his cheek because he knows, logically, that nothing has happened except that Robbie has thrown out his back again.

_And yet._

Robbie meets his eyes. Something there besides pain, besides embarrassment, besides friendship. It's that look he gets when all of the clues are falling into place and the answer he is not what he expects. He's uncertain. More evidence is needed.

 _I've committed a crime,_ James thinks.

"Sorry, James." Robbie apologizes with a grimace.

_For what? Throwing out your back, keeping me from having dessert, thinking you've figured out why I need to flee? Or all three?_

" S’pose I wasn't careful enough out there."

James nods. _Neither was I._

Laura gets Robbie settled and gives James an accusing look. "I thought you were going to watch his back." She shakes her head slightly as if chastising herself, and huffs. "Sorry. I just hate to see him like this."

"Oi! Hate to be like this. Not his fault." Robbie winces, squirming to get comfortable. "Man always has my back. My own damn fault if I bend the wrong way."

Laura gives an exasperated sigh and turns to James, smiling an apology. "Doubt that we're going to be good company. Especially after I give him a good talking to about taking care of himself."

James takes a deep breath, quelling the childish desire to rail at them both, because he is bloody terrified. He's certain this nascent feeling of what he can only imagine is desire is going to fuck up everything. He's amazed, truly, that their friendship has lasted as long as it has.

He shoves his hands in his pockets so the trembling is not apparent. If he could lean against a doorway, he would do that too—he feels like he might fall over. He needs a cigarette, a stiff drink, and not necessarily in that order.

And even as he has this thought, he pulls up some inner resolve to step back and rationally assess the situation as if it was a crime scene.

_Laura saw something in the kitchen that she may misinterpret. That's a minus._

_Robbie knows something is not right between us, but he may not know what it is. That's a plus._

_No loss, no gain—as long as I leave now before I fuck it up completely. I tried to take care of him out there—I did—and I'm sorry. Neither of you understand how this feels, I know, and neither of you can comprehend how frightening it is to have everything you believed to be true about yourself turned around._

"Thanks for dinner, Laura. Robbie, sorry. I hope you feel better. I have to go," he says, letting himself out.

 


	5. Chapter 5

**_Fallopia japonica_ Notebook**

**_The discovery of Japanese knotweed on a person’s property can come as a blow that completely undermines plans for the future. That’s what happened in the dramatic case of the West Midlands man who, in July 2013, killed his own wife, and then himself, on being told (wrongly, as it turned out) that knotweed from the next-door golf course was going to destroy the value of his house. —Newsweek, July 5, 2014_ **

**Oxford—Present**

"Couldn't send a postcard. Didn't know your new address." James says. He doesn't intend for his tone to have an edge to it, so he softens it with a half-smile.

Robbie doesn't look at him, seems to find something fascinating about his orange juice. "Shouldn't have sprung it on you like that while you were gone. Laura and I had been talking about it and a place came up for auction. Had to move quickly. Shock for Lyn, too, come to that. Didn't mention it till the deed was done."

"Is she upset you're not moving to Manchester?"

Robbie heaves a sigh. "We got a bargain on the house. Prices are going up in Oxford, so when we're ready to move house to a smaller place, we'll make a profit. She's happy to see us making easy money in an investment. Our Lyn can't fathom why I've gone back to work."

"Can't say I blame her."

"You needed my help. Not with the case, but with Lizzie." Robbie says, mouth tight for an instant, before softening to its normal contours. "And you could've called. Marvelous invention, the telephone."

James smirks ruefully. "Yeah, well. About that."

**Spain—Camino Frances—Azqueta—Torres del Rio—Past**

Pilgrims have walked five classic ways walked since the 9th century to the end of the world in Finisterre. In the Middle Ages, criminals were sentenced to make the journey, walking alongside pilgrims paid to walk on behalf of nobility. And there were religious pilgrims seeking enlightenment, forgiveness.

 _Which category do I belong to,_ James wonders as he walks.

In those days, _peregrinos_ followed the stars and faint trails that connected with _calzada_ —Roman roads—paving stones smoothed by the boots of marching Legionnaires. Coming over the rise of rolling green hills to see church steeples in small towns reaching to the sky, a visual affirmation of the power of God.

Now, the paths have been widened since his last walk, the stones turned by Gore-Tex boots and Birkenstock sandals as well as machines that have smoothed and pounded the gravel paths so that they are more easily traveled. Pilgrims ride bicycles, travel by car or bus, rent donkeys to carry their packs. Pilgrimages are started one year, the pilgrim returns home and then completes the journey the following year. Modern, efficient.

And through it all, the churches are still there. There is still the venerable, unwavering view of the omnipotence of God, coming over the rise.

And in addition to the affirmation of God, there is the powerful commercialism of seeing red canopied Coca-Cola kiosks in the distance. Vending machines are everywhere.

The main road to Santiago is marked in pale yellow and gold markers—yellow spray painted arrows along the alleyways of the cities. Concrete, stylized pillars mark manicured trails across the wide plains from Burgos to Leon. Spain is preparing for the next Jubilee in 2021, and each county is doing its best to increase tourism.

The Way is made by walking, they say. Each village is trying to build its own _albergue_ , knowing that pilgrims will be searching for lodging each night. Pope Francis is popular, infusing the Church with evangelical zeal. If he tells his flock to walk, they will.

The Spanish government is preparing the Camino for hundreds of thousands, hoping to avoid the home-made crosses and altars set up to mark those who have died on the journey due to accidents and injury.

James passes a cross of stone, there for centuries, surrounded by rocks left by pilgrims. Further on is a makeshift cross of wood and a faded piece of cardboard lettered in Russian. Hiking shoes hang from this cross.

He thinks of different kinds of pain. Pain numbed over time, pain associated with exhaustion. He categorizes the sharp splintering pain in his feet and the dull throbbing pain in his knees. The chafing pain at his side. Tries to divert his thoughts by watching the movements of a herd of sheep along the road, tries not to step on tiny black turds. Strains to hear the tinkling of bells in the distance.

The towns along the Camino have tours of the small churches, cathedrals, museums, historical sites. A Euro here, five Euros there to open a church and stare at a fresco or take a quick tour. He steeps himself in history, architecture. It is an escape from the thoughts that surface as he walks.

Except for images of misery carved in stone. Why is it easy to portray suffering, death, perdition and difficult to conjure images of the glory of God?

So he thinks of pain. Of victims knowing they are about to die. Of little girls seeing their father dangling high above a courtyard. Of a son stabbed with a famous sword wielded by his adoptive-mother.

The pain in his feet is inconsequential in comparison.

\+ + + + 

He checks his mobile frequently as he carries no maps or guidebook.

The colors of the markers and stylized shells are reminiscent of Sirius as seen from Spanish meadows at night—pale yellow. All roads, including the Milky Way, the Via Lactea—point to Santiago.

Here again the _albergue_ in the village is full. He joins other pilgrims in the rough, camping beneath the stars. As a consolation, the _albergue_ offers a star gazing lecture. It’s cold and the night sky is perfect and clear, phenomenon bright.

It is the night of the supermoon.

The lecturer is American, an expat friend of the _hospitalero_. "When the moon becomes full at the closest point in its orbit to Earth, it’s a perigee full moon. As it rises, it only seems larger because we perceive the sky near the horizon as being farther away than the sky overhead. Keep that in mind as you travel the Camino. Illusions and misperceptions will mess with your mind as you cross the plains of Castile."

James sits cross-legged on the ground, hunched over, carefully rolling a cigarette. He couldn't get cigarettes in the last village. He feels curiously deprived to be making use of tobacco and rolling papers.

Above him, the Milky Way is a swath of tiny stars, all of which may be dead, their dim light only reaching us now. Despite the legend, it wasn't formed by the dust of pilgrim's feet, the lecturer informs them.

A small donation is requested to look through the telescope which is focused on the full moon. James feels like he could reach out and dip his hand in the Sea of Tranquility—he doesn't need a telescope. He could reach into the stars and trail stardust.

"The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of star stuff." The amateur astronomer quotes Carl Sagan without attribution.

"He's quoting Joni Mitchell," whispers a woman. There are murmurs of knowledgeable agreement from this group. A glance at him now that he has lit his cigarette.

 _Typical modern pilgrim,_ James thinks. He moves a few feet away from the woman so that he can smoke without censure. He leans back on his elbows.

 _Laura is so unlike these women. She twinkles,_ thinks James. She is a pulsar, a rotating neutron star, pulling Robbie toward her. _There was a time,_ he thinks, _when I believed all people were one, made by one God, radiant. Connected, sharing a common experience, a common good._

The astronomer continues by saying that a dying star of sufficient mass might possibly collapse into itself and become a black hole.

 _And that would be me,_ sniffs James, smelling pot and wild fennel wafting through the night air. _I am the collapsing star. The black hole._

We expect great things, his family told him. You have so much promise, the university told him. Perhaps you need to reconsider your choice of career, the seminary told him.

Later, he finds himself holding a joint being passed among the group. He’s a copper. He’s about to pass it on and he remembers. Not a copper. Not anymore: he's on leave and may never return. Takes his first hit of marijuana in over a decade. Coughs till his eyes water. It’s stronger than he remembers. There’s laughter and wine, then. Pats on the back.

A hand that stays at his back. An arm that rests companionably across his shoulders. He can't seem to connect the arm with a face. There are smiles, though. More wine. More pot. Hands beneath his clothing, searching for a wallet.

Something in the pot that turns the moonlight into glowing streaks as he turns his head. He remembers suddenly why he never got into drugs at uni—losing control frightens him on a visceral level—he can't allow himself to let go. Now he surrenders to a stranger’s hands skimming beneath his jacket, so wasted and unwilling to fight that he can only fall backwards to gaze at the stars as he passes out onto his backpack.

In the grey morning light he discovers he was robbed of his mobile, his tobacco and cigarette papers. He has his wallet—it was underneath him. His tent, sleeping bag and cooking gear is gone, too. He is left with the solar charger for the mobile and his book and his dictionary, carefully set aside as if the thief couldn’t be bothered.

Angry at himself—mortified, too—he observes that it is probably better this way. He over packed—too much baggage, throwing things he didn't need into his backpack trying to make a clean getaway. Though he will not be comfortable now on the walk, his burden will be lighter.

It is the first lesson on the journey.

**Oxford—Present**

“You were robbed. No wonder you never called.”

James sighs, wishing he could tell Robbie everything about that night on the mountain, could explain his embarrassment. Stupid, naïve. Retaining his wallet by sheer, dumb luck. _Bloody trusting for a copper, expecting people to be basically good, especially on a religious highway. Naturally the sheep are preyed on by wolves._

And he truly doesn't want to mention smoking a joint.

_"Theology students don't go in much for that sort of thing, do they?" asked Robbie in relation to a case when they first met._

_"You wouldn't think so," he remembers telling Robbie._

Years later at a drugs bust, he spoke out to Innocent in favor of decriminalization, so Robbie knows how he feels about a victimless crime.

But he doesn't want to go into it. The mood is easy between them now, and the Way is miles long yet.

Even though he knows how the story ends, he doesn't know how this story between them now will end.

It's a tangle of emotions better left buried for now.

Robbie gives him an understanding smile. "It happens. Go on, then."

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

The Cherwell is not providing its usual comfort. After dinner with Robbie and Laura the night before, he went home to finish most of a bottle of wine.

He needs this early morning row to clear his head. It's a bright, cheery morning: blue skies and birdsong. The spires of Oxford pierce the sky.

He thinks of knives protruding from flesh.

The oars of his scull hitch, making a squeak that penetrates his earbuds, his bones, his being. He forces the oars into the water. Lush greenery lines the river here.

He rows, remembering drowning victims, bodies bloated and pale, floating beside the banks, tangled in the weeds. Dead children found in cisterns. Water does horrible things to a corpse.

Swinging the boat around using a single oar, he rows back to the dock.

His nightmares are filled with swings. The swing of a body from a rope, the swing of a hammer against a skull, a child’s empty swing in a garden.

The breeze on his face is cold. He realizes that he is crying. He's thankful again that there's no one to see. It happens more and more often now, though. He won't be able to hide it for much longer. He wipes his eyes with the heels of his hands, wipes his nose on his sleeve.

He has to get away from Oxford.

**Spain—Camino Frances—Logrono—Najera—Past**

Storks build their nests of twigs here atop the church steeples beside iron crosses—a juxtaposition of life and death that doesn't escape James's notice.

He passes a fence with toothpick crosses woven between the wire mesh. Sees paving stones in the plaza of giant _juego de la oca_ —the Game of the Way. Sees all the ways the pilgrim leave their mark upon the land as they pass. Everything is left behind.

He wants to take a few things with him.

In Navarrete, at a potter's market, he sees a small round vase, the kind that might hold a single flower or a few pencils. Something to sit on a desk or a windowsill. Or a table set for two. Without worrying about how he'd manage to carry it over the next few weeks without breaking it, he buys it thinking, _Laura would like that._

The clear light blue glaze is the exact shade of Robbie's eyes, the exact shade of a Spanish sky.

And James buys a walking staff and a knife to whittle a hand-hold at an appropriate height. Later, he sits at a table in the _albergue_ , using the same knife to pare off chunks of white hard cheese.

"Sharp?" asks a pilgrim.

James hands the man his knife.

The man tests the blade, grunts, and nods. "Good."

The knife makes its way around the table, judged and used for cheese, apples, carrots. All who eat at this _refugio_ are expected to help cook. A woman puts the cut vegetables in a pot.

"Could do serious damage with that," says a man in French, returning the knife.

"Blade's too short to really get to the heart, though." James trims the fat from the raw beef into chunks for meat stew. "Carotid artery, right there." James puts the point to his neck. He casually wipes the blade on the leg of his trousers before folding it and putting it in his pocket. "Quick. Messy, though." He slides the meat from the cutting board into a pot.

"Planning to use it for that?"

"Only if I catch the guy who snatched my iPhone," James says, off-handed and sarcastic. He goes to a tap outside to wash his empty wine glass, the cutting board, and his knife.


	6. Chapter 6

**Spain—Camino Frances—Logrono—Past**

He thinks often of Robbie’s fingertips brushing dirt from his forehead. Without thinking, he transforms it from a casual touch into a caress.

Then he consciously makes the imagined caress into a benediction. Like a smudge from Ash Wednesday.

He wants to lengthen his journey by crossing to the Northern Way, Camino de Norte, of mountains and seaside. The terrain would be forested, wet, cool. Or perhaps to the Camino Primitivo. But without his mobile as a guide, without the GPS, without a proper map—he'd be even more lost than he feels now.

It's enough that he feels emotionally lost here on a path that is clearly marked.

He could buy another phone. Buy a map. But he thinks of this between towns, never while he is in a place where he could take care of it. It's an odd thing, but one learns to respect these teachable moments on the Camino.

He thinks he is meant to find his own way.

He stands in the dark church in Logrono.

The air in the church is cool, the air scented with beeswax candles, old wood, and stone. The door faces away from the sun so that the light on the fresco is from the high stained glass windows only.

Saint James.

Beheaded. First apostle to die for Christ. A metamorphosis from a peaceful fisherman into Santiago el Matamoros riding a white steed and lopping off the heads of the Moors during the Reconquest.

 _Definitely not a politically correct image,_ James thinks. _But I can identify with saint becoming sinner. Has a certain resonance, that._

He doesn't know what he is anymore.

He wonders if he, too, is losing his head like St. James the Moorslayer. He was once the gentle soul, the kind man. Now he feels like a killer.

He can't seem to stop thinking of Santiago Matamoros wielding a scythe and chopping away at Japanese knotweed.

**_ Fallopia japonica Notebook _ **

**_An escaped ornamental, Japanese knotweed is often found in waste places, neglected gardens, roadsides, and along stream banks. The operative word is neglect. —Department of Ecology, State of Washington, US_ **

**_Weaken the plant by cutting off the top growth every two to four weeks. Let the cut stems wither in the sun until dead before digging up and disposing of them. Be diligent, don't neglect your eradication plan! —Gardenersworld.com_ **

**_Flood with salt water. Rivers of tears. —Organic gardening list serve in answer to the question: "How the bloody hell do I get rid of this fucking knotweed?"_ **

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

When he gets in to work after his early morning row, James pulls another cold case file from the cardboard box on his desk. Jean Innocent's idea of keeping him busy is working surprisingly well. He suspects that some DC rifled through the files to make sure there were no dead children or teenagers to set him off, no photos of blood baths. No rape, no hangings.

Financial crimes. Theft of a valuable painting. Drugs. Almost benign, somehow.

"Hello, you." Laura looks in from the office door, hesitating, a slight smile on her face. She is holding a plastic container out to him. "You forgot your pie last night."

He's too stunned to react appropriately. Stares for a moment longer at her outstretched hand.

"It's apple. Good, too. C'mon then, it won't bite." She slips in, holding the pie in front of her as if she's tempting a wild animal.

"Cheers," he whispers, taking it from her. It's a big piece—lion’s share. She's not angry at him, then? He tries his voice again, more confident this time. "How's Robbie this morning?"

She leans against Robbie's desk, folds her arms, and examines him. "He had pie for breakfast."

James bites his lip to hide a grin. "He must be feeling better."

"He is. Feet up, heating pad, paracetamol, and _The DaVinci Code_."

James frowns. "Might have given him a better book." _Shit, why did I say that?_

"Deserved it." She shrugs. "Had to give him a good talking to for pushing himself."

James presses his lips together, feeling tentative, and gives a regretful smile. "I broke your—" the word feels strange in his mouth—"boyfriend." His brows knot together in consternation. _There has to be a better word._

Laura snorts a laugh, then, seeing his dilemma. "'Boyfriend'? Suppose that's what he is." Her eyes twinkle.

_She loves him. I can't forget that she loves him, too._

She seems to consider this problem of what to call Robbie, as if it never occurred to her before. "'Lover' sounds too continental. 'Gentleman friend' sounds too old. 'Beau' was the name of our neighbor's hound." She smiles as if this is a delightful joke that she'll share with Robbie later; the laugh lines around her eyes deepen. "My 'beau'—should call him that. Oh, or 'fancy man' which sounds—"

"Sounds bizarre." James pretends to straighten his desk. "Why not fiancé?" He feels heat rising to his cheeks. "Though it's certainly none of my business," he admits.

She cocks her head, nods slowly, as if she expected this. "True. But you'll probably know before I do. Sometimes he makes decisions without consulting me, thinking I'll like the surprise." She relaxes, her back hunched, her arms folded. "If he asks you to research 'cut' and 'clarity,' that's when I want you to remind him that I wear gloves for a living. Likely to lose the ring down the drain in the morgue. A juicer is more practical." She pauses significantly.

He can feel his eyebrows knotting as he absorbs this information. _So they have talked of marriage. Why don't I feel happy to hear that?_

Her slight smile is warm. "If Robbie and I ever marry, you think that you won't be coming over on Friday evenings any longer? You think your days as our personal Scrabble referee will be over? You imagine that you won't be bringing over casseroles when Robbie burns dinner?"

He shakes his head a bit, huffing a tiny laugh, as he opens his mouth.

"Don't bother to deny it—I know a Hathaway dish when I see one."

"He burns water." He takes in the amused look on her face. He can't believe his good fortune: she doesn't hate him. Maybe it will be all right with Robbie, too. _Maybe._

"I thought that saucepan looked new." She sighs, leaning forward to look at him intently, her meaning clear. "James. Don't think you're getting rid of us that easily."

Tears prick his eyes, an unexpected response to her gaze. He blinks a few times, hoping she hasn't seen. Knowing that she has.

He indicates the files. "Things to do."

"Oh." She stares at the files meaningfully. "Robbie was working on these cold cases, too." She turns around to look at Robbie's desk, spots a box on the floor. "He pulled some of the files." She reaches down, opens one, glances through it, sets it aside with a sigh. "That one stuck with me for ages."

 _Of course. Robbie went through the files so that I might be spared,_ James thinks. _He might be right, though. Perhaps I shouldn't look._

_There are more files in that box than there are in the box on my desk. So many cold cases. So many bodies. So many families without answers._

_So many dead children._

_Aren't we our brother's keeper? Is that why I feel partly responsible? Residual Catholic guilt? But I feel like I should have known, though, should have handled Adam differently—why? Because he had a child's drawings tacked to his bulletin board? Because he seemed sensitive? Because I wanted him to understand the importance of the evidence we were finding and he wasn't listening? How could I have possibly known what was going on in his head?_

_I couldn't. Not a mind reader. I know that, I do know that. Logically. But logic doesn't help a burdened spirit. It's not just his death, it's all of them. And a conviction is cold comfort._

_When did I become such a fucking emotional mess?_

"James?" Laura's hand is on his shoulder; she's searching his face, looking into his eyes, a mix, he thinks, of clinician and friend. He realizes that he must have been quiet for too long. "Coffee," she says. "Yes, I think I need coffee. And so do you. You're shivering, do you know? Let's you and I get some coffee. Something with foam? Come with me, then. A little walk. Up you go."

He rises automatically, grateful to be ordered about until he can regain his equanimity. He stares again at the files sitting on his desk.

When he had picked up the file box from Innocent a few days ago it had been covered in dust—messed up his shirt sleeves with long black streaks.

Reminded him of tire tracks on a body—one of the first photos in the files—

"Yeah," he says, grabbing his jacket from the back of the chair.

\+ + + +

Mid-morning, the line at the café is long. They chat about inconsequential work matters: budget cutbacks, the new crop of constables and their inability to spell, disappearing pens and pencils.

"I've always had a jar of writing utensils at hand, but I think we need to mark them in some way. Wei suggested taping an artificial flower to the top of each pen so that people would be embarrassed to make off with them."

"Isn't that a bit too cheery for a pathology lab?" James says, dubious. "Too close an association between flowers and funerals, perhaps?"

"Good point." She's watching him over the rim of her cup. "I was thinking of the staff, not the victims' families, but you're right." Her eyes are kind. "You're always looking out for them, I know."

He glances away, lost in thoughts of flowers. Cascades of lilies on a child's coffin, sprays of narcissus in front of a young man's ashes. Heads of roses lopped off as one prunes to shape a bed. Oh, there are so many metaphors for murder and remorse in a garden.

He doesn't need to talk about this right now. He's fine. Or he will be. He can get through this, he's managed before. Then again, everything was simpler before.

Laura places her hand on his, squeezing it gently, and leaves it there. She doesn't look at him, though. It's a comfort, her respect of his privacy. Her touch is warm against his icy hand and he has a stray, weird, little thought that twists the sweetness of the moment—how does the touch of my hand compare with that of the dead?

 


	7. Chapter 7

**Oxford—Present**

"There’s a saying. From Logrono to Leon, a pilgrim’s demons surface with the heat of the _meseta,_ attacking and tearing him down from all sides." James lights a cigarette. He nods to himself as he decides. "There was a woman."

"Well. A woman." Robbie’s eyes light up. "A real woman?"

James purses his lips slightly, and he frowns. "The inflatable woman taken in evidence from a drugs bust was missing from the evidence locker, so, yes, a real woman."

"Laura will be pleased to hear it. If I can tell her, I mean."

"Are things so boring in paradise that you need to discuss my sex life with Laura?"

"Sex? There was sex?"

James looks heavenward. He should never have mentioned it. Perfect time to tell him, though, that it was an attempt to sort himself. If only he could bring himself to do so. He prefers to talk flippantly about the encounter as a means of keeping Robbie from knowing that his need for a lack of intimacy seems too intimate. He sighs.

_God, this is complicated._

"Aw, man, you know I’ve been saying all along that you need a partner. Just nice to know you—" Robbie stalls, as if he regrets drawing attention to a painful topic. "—hadn’t ruled it out."

_Of course I haven't ruled it out. I want you as a partner and you have Laura. That was the problem. But I think, I hope, I want to believe that I can live with it. I want you to believe it, too._

James drinks his pint and sets the glass down with deliberate smirk. Just a normal conversation. Two mates discussing a one night stand. Blessedly mundane, ordinary, even.

_It feels wrong. He's looking at me as if he's never seen me before._

James flicks ash from his cigarette, not wanting Robbie's hesitation to become an apology. _He imagines he's hurt my feelings, and it's not that, not that at all._ "Given my record, I didn’t want witnesses," he quips, trying to get back to easy banter.

"You bow to this one, too?" Robbie's smile is relieved.

"I’m crushed. Now you know why I don’t share my tawdry tales with you and Laura."

"Was that—did I hear—tales? As in more than one?"

"Legions," quips James. "All along the Camino. Women, men. Sheep. Blisters on my feet, blisters on my—" He shrugs in an exaggerated continental fashion.

"Sheep." Robbie chuckles. "Can just see you leaping through the meadow calling for Shirley."

James gives him a somewhat shy lopsided smile. "Her name was Anna."

**Spain—Camino Frances—Santo Domingo de la Clazada—Belorado—Ages—Past**

"Would you please take my picture? In front of that—whatever it is." She hands him her mobile, a new iPhone in a blue waterproof case, and shakes out light brown hair from beneath a wide brimmed hat.

"A pilgrim's cairn. A memorial to someone who died here."

He takes two pictures, one of her standing beside the pile of stones with the plains in the distance and the other of her face, the weary smile as she contemplates the road ahead, strands of hair blowing across her cheek. Desolate.

She takes back the phone, "Thanks." She raises an eyebrow at the second picture. "I think."

Anna is from Vancouver, works in an office, recently divorced.

She throws her name at him in defiance of custom: people on Camino talk for hours before sharing their name. Some never share their names.

"Knowing my name will not give you power over my soul," she tells him.

"My name is James."

"Really?" She gapes at him. "You'd better change that. Last name is—?"

"Hathaway."

"Well, Hathaway," she says, emphasizing each syllable, "You've been tricked. Never should have told me your name, much less your full name." She takes his photo with her iPhone. "Now I've captured your essence."

In the photo she shows him, the blue sky is stark against the white of the hat barely shading his sunburned forehead and neck; fields of grain are reflected in his sunglasses. His mouth is turned down at the corners, sad rather than sullen. A puzzle, rather than a portrait. He looks rumpled.

"Tall, blond, brooding. It must be a challenge." She quirks an eyebrow and smiles. Flirting.

"It's a burden I manage." He shrugs.

He tells her he is between jobs. In his last job he worked in an office, too. Technically it’s not a lie. He's not sure he'll return. He doesn't want to share details of his profession with her. It almost seems more personal than his name. What he does. What he did.

They walk at almost the same pace, almost in step.

It's a painful reminder of the one man who was always in step with him, so much so that the sound of their footfalls together along Broad Street were indistinguishable. Like the Legionnaires who once marched along this road from Burgos to the sea, protecting the people of the Empire.

James and Anna move to one side of the path, hearing the click of walking sticks against the roadway behind them and a ribbon of bells tinkling as two pilgrims briskly pass them.

"The Camino is like the internet of the Middle Ages," Anna observes. "News of people, events, even recipes travel along without benefit of paper or verification. The people who passed us are Dutch. How do I know? The ridiculous string of bells. There's a guy who walked behind her for hours and begged her to pack them away, but she wouldn't. Each chime is a prayer to God, she said. He's planning to strangle her with them. Another guy suggested poison instead. Apparently you can feed a quail hemlock leaves and it won't kill the bird, but it will kill the person who eats the bird. Isn't that interesting?"

He sighs, looks away. Death has followed him to the Camino. No surprise there, really. He's been seeing it in the frescos, the carved skulls at the base of stone statues.

As if sensing his despair or his disapproval, she doesn't speak. They walk for an hour without speaking. Then two hours. The mood lightens as the silence lengthens. It becomes serene, peaceful. Comfortable.

Just the crunch of their hiking shoes against the ground, equal in speed; almost, but not quite in step.

Pilgrims pass, rushing to beat the threat of rain. Huge masses of heavy, white clouds sweep across the sky casting shadows on the fields. The wind pushes the grass in waves across the plain. The air around them begins to smell like the onset of a storm, dry about to become wet.

After three hours walking in silence beside him at a steady pace, she says softly that she’s walking to clear her head.

He says that he is walking to clear his head too.

Although the sky grows dark , the fields seem brighter than before; patches of metallic gray sky intensify the golden fields. Lightning streaks across the clouds; thunder echoes against the hills.

The first thing they do with their clear heads is to cloud them over a bottle of wine in Belorado as the rain pounds the roof of the small _albergue_. Warm, dry, fed, and drinking with other pilgrims. It is crowded at the long table and as a joke, she sits in his lap to give her chair over to someone who has blistered feet.

James doesn’t mind the weight of her. Doesn’t mind the arm amicably across his shoulders. Doesn’t mind the casual assumption of a relationship where none exists.

It feels blessedly normal. He pulled. He is on holiday, a little drunk, with a pretty woman on his lap. Everyone at the table is smiling at him.

He is a god, he is.

He smirks, aware of how ludicrous it seems and pours more wine.

"Does anyone else think of the Camino as the medieval equivalent of the internet?" Anna ventures, addressing the others sitting at the long table. She sips wine.

The other pilgrims leap onto this concept. Yes, exactly! Gossip travels from one end to the other and have you seen the Dutch pilgrims with the bells? Why, they all have them! All of the ruddy Dutch! What does it mean? Why do they do it?

"They believe it wards off the poison in hemlock," James says, wryly, toasting the group with his wine glass before polishing it off.

Anna ducks her head against his neck and giggles. She whispers hot and breathy in his ear: "You're evil, Hathaway, you know that? Starting a rumor like that."

The pilgrims love the idea of the Dutch tinkling through the Spanish plains warding off the poison in hemlock. There's good natured laughter, too, as one pilgrim reveals himself to be Dutch and resolves to buy bells at Burgos.

Later when all pilgrims go to their bunks, Anna slides off his lap and says good night with a brief kiss on his lips. "Not up for that tonight. Maybe tomorrow we can share a room?"

 _Right, yeah. That. Normal men do That, don’t they._ He corrects himself: the vast majority of males. It's easier though, to say "normal." Or "typical." Or people who are not him.

His legs are asleep, but apparently other portions of his anatomy were not.

He hadn't noticed.

It happens. A response to friction, nothing more. Though he enjoyed the affection, the feel of her mouth against his. It was—pleasant. Nice, even. Compares it to what he imagines it would be like to kiss Robbie. It's something he's only very rarely considered before—kissing Robbie. Can't imagine that Robbie would want him to, for one thing.

The feeling of warmth and inclusion—normalcy—dissipates as he considers his situation.

_Robbie has Laura and I'll never have him. Not that way. And having those feelings in addition to the—love—I feel for him would truly ruin everything we have now. Even if he was—what? bisexual or even simply curious—I can't give him what he would want—not like that. Can't betray Laura by even considering the possibility seriously. Can't betray myself._

_Am I betraying Robbie by considering a liaison with a woman I've just met? What would Robbie do? Cheer me on, I suppose._

_Bit disheartening, that._

He rubs his hands on his thighs trying to restore circulation, finishes his wine. Endures a knowing leer from the _hospitalero_ who gestures that he should remain seated.

James rises, face burning. He doesn’t do That. Hasn’t done—can’t bear to think about how long ago it’s been. But he’s done it before. Sure, if he was honest with himself, if he was going to do it at all, he’d prefer a specific man. A man he can’t have.

Not a woman who is an utter mystery.

But he reacted. Friction? Frisson? Which? Some part of his mammalian brain reacted.

He's surprised he hasn't picked up his pack and started walking to the next town to avoid the situation.

Though that's still an option.

No, he feels he needs to see if that brief moment he had shared with Robbie was unique to Robbie alone.

Though that will be the test: if he does have to stop loving the man because of this change in himself, how will he maintain the friendship? He's seen too many cases of ex-lovers turned killers when people who were intimate are no longer able to remain friends.

He'd always been happiest—well, at least able to function most appropriately—when he focused on pleasing the other person. His satisfaction was emotional, rather than physical.

But he can't imagine anything more satisfying than holding someone (Robbie) close, kissing (Robbie) them, sharing whispers (Robbie) across the pillows in their bed as they grow old together. His daydreams of a life with Robbie have waxed and waned over the years, but now that Laura and Robbie are together?

_Can't happen._

Upstairs, the crowded dormitory-style room is filled with the sounds of pilgrims: rustles and snoring and farting and whispers. He is stretched out on a pallet less than a foot from a person talking on their mobile. Someone is saying the rosary, softly, and the litany resonates without comfort.

He hasn't had a decent night's sleep since he left Roncevalles. No, he hasn't been sleeping well for months. He doesn't have his iPhone, so he has no music, no earbuds, no way to drown out the sounds around him. A round of coughing begins on the other side of the room, and he thinks he will resort to just about anything—short of murder—for some silence.

It takes forever to get to sleep.

_Share a room with Anna? It might not be a bad idea after all._

First thing in the morning he looks up the Spanish word for condom in his dictionary, buys one at _farmacia,_ and asks the _hospitalero_ for the name of a town along the Way the next day that has a hotel. He is on holiday. He can pretend to be the Yorkie bar guy with a copy of _Loaded_ at home under the bed. He can.

Well, he can try.

Legends along the Camino tell of gifts ignored by pilgrims at their peril. So he doesn't know if this opportunity to learn more about himself—and possibly more about his feelings for Robbie--is a temptation or a blessing.

The name 'Anna' means 'Favored by God,' she told him. And there is power in knowing the meaning of a name. So perhaps this encounter is ordained.

At least he'd like to believe that. After last night—awakened by people packing to leave before dawn, the sounds of someone groaning with leg cramps—he'd share a bed with anyone as long as they were in a room alone with a proper bed.

He's back at the _albergue_ before the sun comes over the rise, pretending that he's done nothing in the last forty minutes. Pilgrims rise early, this _albergue_ will close at nine in the morning to get ready for pilgrims again in the evening.

The old _hospitalero_ grins knowingly, nudging James's side as he shoulders his pack to leave. "You want my advice?"

"No," says James, aghast. He pays for his coffee and gets one for Anna before going out to sit on a bench to wait.

He dons his sunglasses, unnecessary in the grey foggy morning, and tries to look rakish and cool waiting outside for Anna. He lights a cigarette.

 _Yeah, pretending to be the Yorkie bar man._ He huffs a laugh. _Right._

Anna sweeps out of the _albergue_ , also putting on sunglasses. She looks over the rims of them at him. "We're not fooling anyone," she says, pushing the glasses up onto her nose. She takes the coffee with a little bow.

He clicks his heels together and inclines his head toward the wet walking path, muddy from the rain.

"I told everyone that you are traveling in cognito. A minor British nobleman." She tosses this over her shoulder as she walks slightly ahead of him.

"You've got it all wrong. I'm MI6." He catches her up. "Hathaway," he intones, seriously. "James Hathaway."

Caught mid sip, coffee spurts out her nose and mouth as she laughs uncontrollably. She shakes her head, coughing, waving off offers of assistance from a passing pilgrim.

 _"Ca va?"_ asks the pilgrim, jerking his chin at James.

 _"Okay. Il est mon ami,"_ she says. She gives James an appraising once-over and confides to the Frenchman, _"Je souhaite qu'il était mon amant."_

The Frenchman snorts and launches into a list of James's shortcomings in rapid-fire French: too tall, too blond, too English. _"Plus particulièrement—"_ He wiggles his little finger and makes a sad face.

 _"Je parle très bien le français."_ James grins easily, understanding all of it.

The Frenchman walks with them till mid-morning, sharing stories he's heard along the Camino. There are more thefts than usual this year. Hard drugs, too. Hundreds of years ago pilgrims walked in complete safety; the shell of St. James protected the _peregrino_ just as the cross protected the _romero,_ the pilgrim to Rome. “Do you carry the shell of the pilgrim,” he asks them both.

Anna has a scrap of cloth with an awkward drawing of a shell pinned to her backpack.

"My shell was stolen," James quips. It isn't far from the truth. He tells them his belongings were taken while he wasn't watching; how he was left with his clothes, a book, a dictionary, a solar charger, his wallet.

They walk. The Frenchman talks and talks, striding then slowing. It is an awkward pace. The fog burns off leaving the day clear and blue above, dotted with fluffy clouds. The air is invigorating, not filled with dust like the day before.

They could be making good time, but they are not.

Neither James nor Anna seem to know how to be rid of the man. At San Juan de Ortega, they stop for _bocadillo,_ ham and cheese tucked into a hard roll; fill their water bottles. As James returns from the toilet behind a building, he sees the Frenchman give a wave before heading off to join another group of pilgrims. He hears the tinkling of bells.

Breathes a sigh of relief.

"He tried to give me his name. I said I didn't want to know," says Anna as he returns, getting up from her spot on the ground beside their backpacks. "He wanted to watch our packs." She shakes her head. "He didn't feel right."

"How do you know I won't make off with your pack?" James genuinely wants to know.

"I have nothing worth taking. And you've already lost everything." She gestures at the Frenchman's retreating form. "Word along the Camino is to watch out for a fast talking Frenchman."

"Any word on the tall blond Englishman?"

She looks down at her feet, and then takes off her sunglasses, squinting at him in the glare of the afternoon sun. He moves slightly so that the sun is not behind him. "Thanks. For a moment there you had a halo thing going," she says. "I heard you were kind. Watch my pack, will you, please?"

 _Kind? Ah._ Three, no, four days ago he had seen an older man with a trimmed white beard and a florid, overheated face resting beside the road before Virgen del Poyo. He stopped, shared his orange, offered the man a bit of cheese and bread. Over cigarettes, the man, a German, told him that he was walking in the memory of his wife who had died six months before.

I'm not sure I'll be able to make it to Santiago, the old man said. I'm not as young as I used to be, the old man said. I'll be up in and on my way in another minute or two, the old man said.

"I'll carry your pack to the next _albergue_ ," James said.

His own pack was so much lighter after he was robbed. And because the old man had packed efficiently, it was a simple matter to shoulder the burden of both. They walked slowly.

The old man told him that he heard his wife's laughter whenever he entered a church. What did James think of that?

James didn't know what to say. But he listened, not wanting to intrude on the man's need to talk about his wife and their life together. The man showed James a picture of a short round woman with a cap of grey hair and a sunny smile. Gerta looked like the teacher he said she was. It had been her desire to walk the Camino—he would have preferred to stay at home. The old man slipped into German as he reminisced.

He reminded James of Robbie, of course—it was the way he missed his wife. Though Robbie no longer seemed to miss Val, at least not in the same way. He had never talked about her much to James to begin with. Except that night when they got rid of the mattress Robbie and Val had shared. Odd that James treasured that sad moment, thought of it almost as a gift.

The fact that Robbie had never seemed comfortable talking with James about his life with Val bordered on painful.

Not that he had shared anything of his life, either. But he wonders if he’d had someone, would Robbie have opened up and shared those moments from his past, those parts of himself that he’d kept hidden from everyone, the stories of playing with his children and family holidays and waking up to Saturday chores and making sausages—

The old man had switched back to English. Asking about sausages. Had James tried chorizo? What did he think?

"And why do you think I hear my wife's laughter in church?" the man asked again.

"It's a gift from God," James answered, not quite sure where the words and certainty came from. He met the man's eyes and then looked at the ground, reeling from the sudden sensation of knowing that it was the perfect answer, the true answer, and that the man knew it, too.

_A gift from God._

At the door to the _albergue_ , the old man thanked him, told him he was a kind man.

"Do you want me to stay? To help?"

The old man tilted his head, giving it a minute shake. His eyes shone. "I think it is enough."

There was just the one bed left, so James went to another _refugio_ to spend the night on a floor.

So the news of his good deed had gone before him. Such a small thing to his mind.

And this woman with sunlight in her hair thinks he's kind.

He smiles to himself. _She likes me._

_Bloody hell, she said wants to sleep with me. Second time she's said that, too._

_That should prove—interesting._

_And third time's a charm._

 


	8. Chapter 8

**Oxford—Present**

Robbie is riveted. "So Anna was with you for protection."

"I like to think it was something more than that. My charm, for one thing."

"I'm sure she thought of that after seeing that you could take any man on the Camino."

James stills a rush of unexpected pleasure. "You think I could take anyone I met?"

"Yeah. Browbeat them with lines from the boys in the band and sit on them for good measure. Sock 'em in the jaw. I've seen you fight. Enough to know I'd want you on my side, at any rate."

James quirks a smile. "I missed you, too."

"Then give over! Tell me what happened with the girl!"

 _"'Ir romero, volver ramera'_ –it's an old saying that means, 'Go a pilgrim, return a whore.' I am referring to myself, of course."

"Of course." Robbie purses his lips. "Now you're just taking the piss." But he nods, encouraging James to go on.

Robbie's interest is piercing for some reason. There's a shift between them.

"Not much to tell. We went to a hotel." James shrugs eloquently, sensing the change in atmosphere, not quite knowing what is causing it.

"Did I miss the good part?"

"No. We had dinner, talked, drank a little wine."

"Heartbreaker, you." Robbie's teasing words don't match the look in his eyes.

**Spain—Camino Frances—Past**

_It’s a shag,_ he reminds himself, as he lights a cigarette. _An itch to scratch. A quick screw,_ he thinks, his lips pursing at the disagreeable term he once used when talking with a suspect years ago on his first case. A one night stand story he can share with the single guys in his band over a pint. He's never had a story like this to tell before. Doubts that he is the sort who would actually kiss and tell, but then, he really doesn't know.

He's still feeling chuffed because this is a first: Hathaway as Don Juan. Casanova. Lothario. Romeo. He's read the literature with a certain detachment.

It's an odd thought. He's always managed to evade casual questions on the topic by feigning an air of jaunty casualness and circumventing the truth with a haughty glance. _Me knowing about talking on a sex line? Certainly not, sir—but there are certain tricks to the conversation. Why of course I have no idea where one would find that sort of information on the internet, sir—but try here._

He's done his research. It hasn't helped.

He inhales nicotine deeply and blows it out with force, trying not to think of women—men, too—who have approached him with a gleam in their eye that he has discouraged with a tight, cold smile over the years while thinking of Robbie and wanting, in a distant way, to be true to the man.

But since he fell in love with Robbie, he has been with others. He didn't enjoy it, but he did it almost to cement the relationship he had with Robbie. As if he was saying, "Look, I'm just like everyone else. No worries, sir, not after you that way at all."

And up until now, he would have sworn that was absolutely true.

He's hoping if he demeans whatever this experience with Anna might be from the outset its outcome will have less meaning and importance especially if he finds out—what? That he's still not interested in sex? That he wants to make love only with Robbie—and he keeps circling back to that—a man he can't even have?

Or— _God forbid_ —he's now a sexual person just like everyone else?

He forces himself to look beyond Anna's face and hair as she comes round the building, focuses on her form which is taller than average, wearing T-shirt and walking shorts. _Attractive, yes. Built a bit like Fiona, actually, so at least she has a familiar structure._

_Right. Precisely what a woman would want to hear: you have good joists and fine risers._

He grins to himself, and drops his gaze so that she doesn't ask him why he's smiling.

It wouldn’t do to have her think it means anything to him when, at this moment, this feeling of being "normal" and "kind" means everything. It's a balm applied to an injured spirit. He hopes being with her will break the hold Robbie has on his heart. (Though he had hoped that Fiona would break Robbie's "spell" too, but that didn't work either.)

Perhaps he can tell Robbie. Robbie would like that. Now that he's with Laura, he'd like James to be "playing the field" to find a partner. Maybe then he'd stop feeling sorry for James, stop hinting around for him to find a partner. They could be two mates sharing a pint, James asking for advice now that he's "out there" again.

_Right._

He stubs out his cigarette, pocketing the butt—which earns him a quirky smile from Anna. He helps her adjust her pack and they set off, walking almost in step, enjoying the silence.

Butterflies gambol along the roadside scrub. Legend has it that early pilgrims knew they were taking the correct road by looking for butterflies. An orange butterfly alights on a spray of white knotweed flowers. Anna stops, crouches low to take a picture that encompasses butterfly, flowers, and sky.

He remembers gathering a child's drawings of butterflies and houses and taking them to Rachel's bereaved mother, trying in a too-small way to make up for the anguish he contributed to. The act of kindness should have made him feel better, not worse.

Just as shouldering the old man's burden should have made him feel better, not worse. _I should have done more for him. I could have carried his pack all the way to Santiago. Was this a test,_ he wondered. _Should I have abandoned my own walk to make sure he completed his?_ There was that instant of being closer to God, of being able to comfort, though. Of being able to put his own pain aside. Of having listened and knowing the right thing to say.

He glances at the woman walking beside him and wonders if there is a right thing to say in this strange circumstance. The silence between them is comfortable and he's reluctant to break it.

**Oxford—Present**

James cocks his head, waiting for some response to his tale so far. Raises his eyebrows.

"Despite the—what did you call it—the cheerful promiscuity of my generation—" Robbie glances away again, blows out a long sigh, the corner of his mouth crooked down. "—I wasn't much of a lad, myself, even back in the day. You just met her."

"You were all for it, a minute ago." James hides in the motion of drinking his pint, pressing his lips together, giving a slight shake of his head in irritation. "Isn't this what people do?"

"You don't." Robbie grumbles. "Aw, don't listen to me. I didn't have to look for very long before I found Val. You find your match and that's it." He cradles his glass as if he needs to hold onto something solid, as if he's afraid memories will slip away. He glances at James and sighs. "Laura understands. Good thing, too."

"She said she wants a juicer."

"Come again?"

"No ring. But she'd like a juicer."

Robbie frowns, dubious. "Why'd she tell you?"

James shrugs, wide eyed and innocent, though he knows why, of course. "No idea."

"A juicer."

"Maybe she's thinking of adding carrots and kale to your morning beverage," James says. The "Sir" is implied.

"We were talking about you and this—Anna? Gonna share a room with someone you met five minutes before."

"I was sleeping every night next to people I'd never met at all. Does this bother you?"

"Didn't really think much about it before." He glances away, jaw tight.

 _Why the bloody hell is this bothering him?_ "I was on holiday, Robbie."

**Spain—Camino Frances—Past**

La Cachava Hotel has a wainscoted common room with green checked table cloths and Basque food. The words "devil may care attitude" spring to mind and he believes he can live with that. Anna is flirting with him as if they aren't about to register for a room together—an action that consists of signing their names and producing a few more Euros than usual.

Are you sure, he says. We can get two rooms, he says. I can sleep on the floor, he says.

Hey, it's okay. I understand, she says.

His brows knot together mirroring the knot forming in his gut. _Does she? How could she possibly know when I don't know myself?_

There's just the one room, they are told, but the bed is big. Anna is frowning at him, as if wondering what she's got herself into.

"There's another hotel in the next town," he offers. _I'll just leave you to this, shall I?_

She disarms him with a soft, tentative smile as they stand at the registration desk. Her voice is quiet. "All I want is a good night's sleep. Okay?"

He's relieved, and even more relieved when he sees her smile widen as if she's flattered. As if he is the one who is interested and she's the one demurring. He takes a deep breath, smiles as if he does this every day rather than every decade or so. "Of course. Yeah."

"Narrow escape for you," she quips, grinning at him.

_You have no idea._

He tries to be gallant, but she insists on paying for half and they wind up going Dutch. Which makes both of them laugh out of proportion to the joke, thinking of tinkling bells. They drop their gear off in the small room above the café. He's tempted to skip dinner and go straight to bed, but he senses that he'll sleep better if he's had a glass of wine. Or three.

It is an enormous bed.

He frowns at her. "You knew all along."

"I'd heard. Word on the Camino is that you can get four people in a bed that size."

He raises his eyebrows, mock affronted. "Horrible way to sleep."

"Doubt they were using it for that," she replies dryly.

He’s forgotten how to flirt, if he ever knew how. Though, come to think of it, their conversation along the road has been nothing but banter and innuendo, hardly serious.

Now that the pressure is off, he relaxes.

And she becomes the one who seems tense and ill at ease. _Interesting._

With Scarlett, the conversation was about catching up. With Fiona, it was about not falling behind. With Anna, the conversation seems to hover above reality.

Robbie is the only person he can really talk with. And even then so much is left unsaid.

Anna doesn't tell him much either. In fact, their conversation is spectacular in its lack of concrete, real life information. He's almost afraid that if he asks, he'll slip into interrogation mode.

"So. You work in an office," he says pleasantly. "Must be—" He waits for her to supply a word.

She raises her eyebrows. "Do you really want to know?" She leans forward. "You may not have noticed, Hathaway, but no one on the Camino is talking about their real life. It's all inner life. Spirituality. Goals and aspirations." She waves her hand airily. "The soul."

"I've mostly heard conversations about feet." He glances away, smiling to himself because he's made her laugh at his pun. But she's right. No one talks about their professions, except to lie to others about being secret agents, for example. Or to lie about their ancestral lineage claiming nobility. He wonders what other lies he'll tell before the night is through and finds himself squirming. He's not an adept liar—more an evader of truth—and he doesn't like doing it.

He settles for appreciating Anna's smile, the way her eyes light up when she talks about the rain in Vancouver. She tells him how lush and green everything is there.

“Is Japanese knotweed a problem in Vancouver?” As soon as the words are out of his mouth, he realizes how weird it sounds. _Plant fetishist._

She gives him an odd look. “Don’t even know what that is.”

He sips his wine, feeling his face flush. “Invasive plant. I do a bit of gardening.”

“Oh.”

The conversation stalls. No—it halts. Abruptly. As if she's re-evaluating him, and he can hardly blame her. There's a deadly silence.

They finish the bottle, start another. Their food is taking forever. It is awkward and he’s wishing he could take back his botanical observations and flee. Could dash out the back. _What was I thinking? I don't do this—whatever this is. Why the hell did I think I could do it here when I don't do it at home? Not like I've changed._

_Though maybe I want to. Maybe I have and I don't know it. Maybe I haven't._

_Dear God, just let me get through dinner so we can go to sleep. I'll sort it in my nightmares._

He finishes his wine, pours more for both of them. Wonders if he's slurring his words.

She shrugs, looks away. "I do a lot of reading on the bus into work. Do you read much?”

"Yes. Um." Classics. Pulitzer Prize winning novels. Books you’ve never heard of. Since you’re someone who just works in an office. Who reads on the ride into work on the bus. Who probably reads trashy bestsellers. Or those paperback romances that mum used to read. He knows next to nothing about this woman other than her name, her marital status, and that she rides a bus to work in an office.

And that she's made him laugh for most of a day. That she is almost, but not quite, in step with him. That she is willing to share a bed with him.

She does have pretty eyes, he thinks, trying to keep them in focus despite the wine.

He wants to smack himself for his ego, for immediately thinking that she must not be as well-educated as he is. Not as if he’s the only person in the world who reads.

Anna could be a Nobel Laureate for all he knows. He hasn’t asked. Hasn’t told her a whit about himself, either, except to admit to a tendency to stupidity. Though perhaps that is glaringly apparent at the moment.

Anna is talking. He should be listening. When did he stop listening?

She runs her hand up and down the stem of her wine glass. “You’ve probably never heard of it, but I just finished _The Goldfinch._ It's a good book.”

This is a pleasant surprise. “I liked it, too. It's a decent read. Art, antiques. Russian thugs. Loads to recommend it.”

Her mouth clamps together, as if she's a bit put out by his simplistic review.

"Should I have highlighted the _bildungsroman_ qualities of the novel?" He reaches for her hand, his long fingers curling around her own on the tabletop in a soothing gesture.

_I don't generally reach out to anyone. The last person who held my hand was Laura._

His gaze strays from her face to the wall behind her shoulder. There's a poster of "The Game of the Goose" tacked to the wall, the height of art in this fine establishment. Food is finally on the table—lamb chops and peppers, lots of garlic—on heavy, chipped plates. Commonplace, solid.

_Far cry from an elegant restaurant in Oxford. Whole other world, in fact._

"Do you think that book will be remembered as a masterpiece?"

"It was a good enough book. The kid thought he was keeping a treasure safe, hiding it from everyone when it wasn't there after all—I liked that concept. The magical quality reminded me of Rowling."

He nods, steering the conversation. "So you like children's books rather than adult fiction."

"Hardly a children's book. And you read it too," Anna says.

"It won a Pulitzer Prize."

"But does that make a book good?"

 _Fair question,_ he thinks.

She pushes her plate away with her free hand, and picks up her wine. He feels her hand tense slightly beneath his own, so he gives her hand a slight squeeze before pulling his hand back. He remembers that Laura did that too, before releasing his hand—a compassionate gesture that Anna seems to appreciate. She meets his eyes and tilts her head speculatively.

"Hathaway. What did you bring to read on the Camino, if anything?"

" _ _Don Quixote_._ In Spanish." _Well, that sounds pompous enough._ He bites his lower lip in an apologetic grimace. "Sounds shallow."

She nods, smiling. "Ooooh, in Spanish, no less."

"Not my native language, so yeah."

"And did you bring the book because it is in Spanish, or because of some chiver-ol-ess," she shakes her head. Tries again, "Chilverless—"

"Try 'noble.'" He smirks. "More wine?"

"The Man of La Mancha would never make fun of a lady."

"True, true. Well, then." He stares at the tablecloth, at their hands, which were intertwined a minute ago and are now apart. "I wanted to be reminded that if you look at windmills as if they are giants, then you are insane. But thinking that they might be—well, isn't that prudent when windmills roam the land…?"

She appears to consider this.

His mouth curls up in an ironic smile that softens into something rueful. "Just when you think you understand something, or yourself, you realize that you were wrong. I used to think I understood—everything. Prided myself on it, actually." He settles back in his chair. "I was once an idealist. Like to get back to that." He downs his wine, feeling a little uncomfortable being open with her. He bites the inside of his lip, afraid the wine has made him say too much.

"That's lovely," she whispers. She meets his eyes and glances away, a shy smile on her lips, and when she looks at him again, her gaze is understanding and warm. "You sound as if you've had too much realism in your real life lately."

"A bit," his slight smile is coupled with a huff and the realization that she's right. He drums his fingers on the tabletop, putting an end to that line of thought and pushing images of the dead out his mind.

The rest of the evening is spent discussing their favorite books, which is strangely intimate and surprisingly enjoyable. They talk of visiting second-hand bookstores and the thrill of finding a book you didn't know you needed, of losing yourself in a story.

It belatedly dawns on him that he is enjoying himself. Dinner, discussion—bloody hell, he's on a date.

It's odd. He loves Robbie, but he can almost imagine the man pushing him, saying, "Go on, then," in a Geordie accent. He's convinced that if Robbie was attracted to a woman, he would not need a third bottle of wine to act on it.

 _Intellectual curiosity will be my downfall,_ he muses.

In the pursuit of knowledge, he's researched body language, of course. It's what one does when one is home alone on a Friday night with the internet and a bottle of whiskey when everyone else is out shagging.

It's how he knows that Robbie doesn't love him. Not in that regard, anyway. And how he suspects that although he doesn't feel aroused by Anna, he is attracted to her. Enough to kiss her, at any rate. He glances at his hand on the table—the nails bitten to the quick. Thinks of having a cigarette. Fidgets with his empty wine glass, reluctant to have more wine, though he suspects he'll need it to get to sleep.

He notices her hand warmed to the touch of his hand, but she didn't start touching her neck or looking at him from beneath her lashes in a sultry, alluring fashion, or displaying any other of the hundreds of alleged pop-psychology indicators of sexual attraction. Her eyes aren't dilated, her vocal register isn't higher.

She isn't playing footsie with him under the table.

 _No, she is._ She is gently kicking his shoe with her own.

"Ow," he says, pointedly.

She grins at him.

Because he sees it now. That glimmer of interest from her through an alcoholic haze. And he knows the script, having experienced it before, knows his role. Knows he'll give in to his curiosity. He'll enjoy the closeness, the illusion of romance, even though there's no enduring emotional connection. He suspects he can make it through…

…By thinking of Robbie. It's what he did when he was with Fiona, too, but he didn't equate it with sexual desire. It just made it easier. Imagining the man at his desk, watching him to react to what he read on his computer—eyes widening, eyebrows up, the glint in his eye, the anticipatory smile, the inevitable, "Hathaway!"

"Hathaway?" Anna says. She nudges the side of his hand gently with her own, as if asking permission.

She downs her wine and pours another glass, topping his off as well.

_We are continuing down this road since we know where we are going. Windmills and all._

They head upstairs, drunk, leaning against each other for support. He’s quoting poetry and she’s responding with song lyrics.

"This is my quest, to follow that star…No matter how hopeless, no matter how far..." she sings softly, more speech than vocals.

"What's that?"

"'The Impossible Dream.' Can't remember all of it. Too much wine." She's humming a vague tune. "Oh. 'To fight for the right, without question or pause...To be willing to march into Hell, for a Heavenly cause…'" She punches the air with a fist, trying to carry the tune, and drops onto the bed. "'And I know if I'll only be true, to this glorious quest, that my heart will lie will lie peaceful and calm…'" She stretches out on the big bed, toeing off her sandals. "'When I'm laid to my rest...' God. I don't do this, Hathaway."

"I don't either," he answers, taking off his shoes and setting them neatly beside his pack. His head is swimming. He flops onto the bed, which is huge. He opens his arms—

—And hits her head with his hand. "Sorry! I'm sorry."

"Was my singing that bad?" She rolls toward him.

Yes. "Not really. You okay?" He moves closer, cradling her face in his hand to look. No damage done.

Her arm rests lightly across his side. He moves closer to kiss her forehead. "There. All better."

"Very smooth, Hathaway."

He's reminded of the last time he was this close to someone.

He puts that firmly out of his mind—or tries to—and concentrates on kissing her, his mouth not quite obeying the commands of his brain. Their kisses are sloppy, too wet. He accidentally bangs his head against the wall behind the bed. Someone pounds back telling them in French to keep it down.

She burps her wine and they laugh. And all the while, he is reveling not in desire as much as being held. She guides his hands over her shirt, under her shirt. He fumbles over her breasts, his lovemaking skills lain fallow over the years. She doesn't seem to care. She tugs at his belt buckle. Her fingers scrabbling at his stomach make him giggle helplessly.

He hovers over her. “This is serious. This is my serious face.” He frowns. Very serious.

She laughs at him. He laughs too.

The idea of him having sex is still funny. He remembers Will kissing him and how, as a fourteen year old boy, he thought that kissing would automatically lead to sex as it always did on telly or in films. And although he liked Will and liked the kiss, the idea that he, James Hathaway, would enjoy sex was laughable. He didn't touch himself when he was hard, he couldn't imagine anyone else touching them there—the whole idea was ridiculously funny then, which is why he laughed in Will's face. Didn't matter that Will was a bloke, not at all.

But that was years ago, and he relishes the opportunity now to laugh at himself here in bed. Fiona rarely saw the humor in anything related to the boudoir. And Robbie—he has a mental flash of a glimmer of an eyetooth in a quirky smile, the bit of a laugh, surfacing through the blur of wine and fatigue—it stokes something deep within him, not producing a flame, exactly. More of a willingness to burn if a spark was there.

Thinking of Robbie while kissing Anna—it's a sobering thought. Almost.

He tries to put Robbie out of his mind, concentrates on the feel of Anna's lips against his and wonders what it would be like to kiss Robbie. He's never considered that before, not seriously, not at length, and certainly shouldn't be thinking of it now.

He pulls back. She puts her hands on either side of his face, holding him there as she searches his face. "It's okay. It's all okay." And then she drops her hands with a sigh.

He knows he should move then, get up, leave. But he doesn't. The sigh—he's made that noise himself—feeling crushed, misunderstood, worthless. He kisses her temple, her eyes, and her mouth trying to change the tenor of the moment to one that is tender, sweet.

She smiles at him, understanding that he is placating her, and then kisses the tip of his nose, grinning. It's a challenge of sorts, and he takes it, kissing her in ways and places that make her giggle as he did moments before.

The condom he bought that morning is working its way from his pocket, an unpleasant reminder of his unrealistic expectations for the evening, so he pulls it out to put on the nightstand, getting it out of the way. The satisfaction of being held and kissing and laughing—that's enough for any man.

_Well, it's enough for me, at any rate._

A loud voice from behind the wall tells them to either keep it down or invite them over.

Anna invites them over in French, laughing.

James stares at her and says loudly that he isn’t sharing. He doesn't know what possesses him to do so.

It's an odd moment, one that almost—not quite—sobers him up. _Weren't they going to bed to sleep,_ he wonders? _What happened to sleeping?_

Anna slugs him playfully in the arm and happily adds they’ll have to be content with listening.

James cringes inwardly, a large part of him wanting to crawl away in embarrassment. The other half drunk enough to want to give the anonymous listeners on the other side of the wall something worth listening to. Because—hell, he was going to be the Yorkie bar man, wasn't he? Even prepared for it. He doesn't care that he announces this to her and to the wall.

He pulls up her shirt and settles his head and mouth between her breasts, and slides a hand between her legs beneath her clothes, tugging at her shorts as she wriggles them off.

He remembers that Fiona liked this and that is comforting because he would really like to get this over with so that he can keep his dignity and go to sleep.

She arches into his touch. She opens the condom he set on the nightstand and reaches for him.

_Shit._

It’s not a big deal, she says. It happens to guys all the time, she says. Is it me, she asks.

From the other side of the wall, a French voice says, loud and sympathetic. "It’s the wine."

James is mortified. He drops his head to her shoulder, wanting the indignity to go away, wanting everything to go away.

Anna pulls back, the look in her eyes is hurt, as if this happens to her all the time. She searches his face, easing her embrace. Pausing as if asking for his consent. Giving him room to flee if he wants.

It's this consideration of his feelings that makes James hold her too tightly. Not you, not you. It’s the wine. Too much wine. It’s the situation—he says to the blank wall. _It's me,_ he admits to himself. "Perhaps in the morning," he tells her, hoping that biology will help him in this. "For now, let me." And he proceeds to make love to her with an intimacy and intensity crossing the line from one night stand to something unexpected that he's not sure she really wants—

—and he is certain that he doesn't want at all. Not like he feels he can stop now, though.

She is gripping his shoulders hard as he uses his mouth and hand. But it's surprisingly quick and she's very loud. He's still drunk enough to feel a brief rush of satisfaction, despite being embarrassed.

 _Fiona was a decent teacher, apparently,_ he thinks.

Anna pulls him close, pressing tiny kisses to his neck and shoulder, her arms fitting precisely where they should so that his bony frame is comfortable against her. He wonders if her ex-husband was slender and tall, too—it would explain why she initially approached him on the Camino. _A familiar structure._

She gives him a happily confused look, as if she wonders what possessed him. Too desperate by half to work himself up over a woman he barely knows. Consideration taken to new heights.

His jaw hurts.

She presses her forehead to his. Huffs a sigh and closes her eyes. Kisses him gently.

He tries to ignore the sounds coming from the next room.

She falls asleep, her head nestled against his neck. Or feigns sleep. Her breathing is even and he's not inclined to press further.

There are no curtains on the window. James stares at the bright squares of moonlight on the hotel room floor. Watches them dim as the world turns and a new day begins. He thinks of Adam Tibbitt, who—when pushed, when—tormented?—admitted to James that he spent the night crying in his girlfriend's arms.

And now Adam will never cry again. So many children will never fall in love, will never grow up to be held in a lover's arms.

James's tears are sudden, hot. Completely unexpected. Feeling sorry for Adam, for Robbie. For an old man he barely knows who is walking a path he didn't choose. For himself. Mainly for himself. He tries not to move, tries not to make a sound.

 _Normal men don't cry in a strange woman's arms,_ he thinks. _Damn far from being a god now._

_Damn far from God in general._

It is that last thought that shatters his resolve and his false pretenses of being a typical guy who reads _Loaded._ Rips up his imaginings of being a bloke who lives for musicals and dancing shoes, too.

He's lost his closeness to God. Lost himself. And yet he can't seem to lose Robbie. And he needs to lose whatever it is he feels for Robbie.

Because now he knows: it's Robbie and the love he feels for the man that has sparked the tiniest bit of desire. No question: he needs to extinguish that spark.

Anna shifts and takes him in her arms, saying nothing, holding him close. It's as if a dam breaks. Rocking him silently, his head cradled in the crook of her arm, her cheek pressing against the top of his head. Almost a maternal embrace.

Meant as comfort, it reminds him of a loss suffered long ago and he weeps—racking sobs accompanied hot-faced shame. No longer bothering to hide his tears, he remembers the last time he cried this hard: Zoe Kenneth was holding him, then, telling him that love was never wrong. And then she tried to set them both on fire.

"They say everyone cries at one time or another along the Camino," Anna whispers into his hair, as he sniffles, trying to regain control, trying not to get snot on her.

He considers this, shifting so that he can hold her, too. Wanting control over the situation and losing it all to an exhausted sleep minutes later, their arms wrapped around each other.

She reaches for him at dawn.

_And—no. Nearly every morning for over twenty-five years and this morning—no._

He just wants to hold her, be held, he says. She tries to arouse him with her hand. Nothing happens.

She clamps her lips together, as if worried she'll say the wrong thing. He takes her hand away, presses it to his lips, an apology.

Too much wine last night, he lies. Bloody awful headache, he lies. It’s not you, he lies.

Because it is her. She's not Robbie.

She huffs a sigh. Her mouth is turned down, bottom lip crumpled. She looks as if she might cry.

_Because everyone weeps at least once along the Camino._

He couldn’t bear it if she cried. He’s the one who should be crying again. Certainly feels like he should. _What the fuck is wrong with me,_ he wonders. _What was I thinking, to try this again when I should know better._

She gets up, giving him a faint, sad smile, pulling on a long t-shirt. Goes down the hall to the bathroom.

He stares at the ceiling. Wanting to take a shower, start walking. Get away. He throws on shorts and the shirt he was wearing the day before, not wanting to be naked when she returns.

Maybe he should have taken whatever advice the old _hospitalero_ had to offer.

She comes back, having taken a quick shower. She takes his hand holding it in both of her own. "Thank you for last night. For all of it. I'm not sure—" She shrugs. "I don't do this, James. I don't think you do either, and now it feels weird. I don't think I can help you even though I want to. You never really told me why you’re walking, but I think you’d better do it alone for now."

He nods. Brushes her lips briefly with his own. Grabs his kit and goes down the hall.

Wills himself not to think of every single fucking moment that has led up to this one.

When he comes back, he discovers that she has taken his copy of _Don Quixote_. She left him a note with her mobile number and instructions to call her if he wants the book back.

Now his burden is even lighter.


	9. Chapter 9

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

"Well, I know you’re coming back. Wouldn’t be leaving your guitar otherwise." Laura scans her bookshelves. "This might suit." She hands him a copy of Cervantes’ book, _Don Quixote_. "Sure you’re up for the original Spanish?"

" _Si."_

"That’s not going to get you very far." She plucks a dictionary from the shelf. "Took a little Spanish."

"I am constantly amazed at your verisimilitude."

She makes a wry face. "Good word. Looking forward to Scrabble on your return."

He inhales deeply, holding his breath. She's making dinner, warmly inviting him to stay. She and Robbie are having something Italian. She's trying to get Robbie to give up the fried foods that have raised his cholesterol, trying to get him to eat more veg. Trying to get him to try something other than pub sandwiches and microwave meals. The table was already set for two when James dropped by mostly unannounced with the guitar and his news of walking the Camino.

And now, knowing that she truly wants him to stay, he has to leave. He doesn't want to run into Robbie. Not yet. Not until he figures this out. Doesn't want to risk subjecting himself to scrutiny and possible judgment. Or worse yet—pity.

I can’t stay, he says. Taking care of loose ends, he says. I’ll call Robbie before I leave, he says.

"See that you do, James. We'll miss you." She sighs, seeming to see through the lies.

He holds up the books. "Cheers. I’ll send a postcard."

She stretches up, kissing him on each cheek. "Take care. Be safe."

He smirks. "Me on a walking holiday. What could possibly happen?"

**Oxford—Present**

"Anna up and left?" Robbie is stunned.

"We said our goodbyes. I slept in for a few hours." James feigns detachment. He's not sure he wants Robbie to know he couldn't bear to leave, couldn't take the chance that he might meet up with Anna on the Camino before he was ready to talk about what had happened. That he wanted to catch up on sleep, on crying, on ruminating over every poor decision he'd made in the last eight years.

That he wanted to pray.

"So Anna took Laura’s book. But you brought back the book, so you must have run into Anna again."

"In a manner of speaking." James nods, the corner of his mouth quirking up as he remembers how he got the book back. "But I'll get to that eventually."

He notices the way Robbie's mouth crumples as he looks away, notices that the jocularity is now a bit forced, notices the way Robbie's hands are no longer relaxed on the table. No, they're curling into fists, his entire body is hunching in on itself as if for protection. His blue eyes skitter away going dark as they do when he worries. As they return to James's face, the look is tinged with sadness and regret, his lips clamping shut. He sighs and the plaintive heave of the man's shoulders goes straight to James's heart.

_Isn't this what he wanted? Didn't he want me to "find a partner" like he did?_

_Was I wrong?_

James stubs out his cigarette, knowing he can't mention what he sees in Robbie's reaction, but his mind and his heart is racing. "Not much happened. We shared a bed," he reassures Robbie. He tries to look rakish and cool—like he did outside the _albergue_ that morning before it all went to hell.

Lewis blows a raspberry, having none of it. But he smiles, as if sharing this incident has been a welcome gift—not for the gift itself, but for the trust it took in the telling. He slowly unfolds, like a flower.

_There I go again, thinking of him as some bloody plant._

"Go on. All imagination, I'll wager." Robbie tosses the words off lightly.

"I do have a vivid imagination." James lights another cigarette, watching the smoke curl, soothing himself with nicotine. "Keeps me warm at night. It’s a long road to Santiago and the paths of the pilgrims weave across the land," he says, striking a nonchalant attitude, waving the cigarette in the air.

"Better your imagination than sheep," Robbie quips, eyebrows on the rise.

James sips his pint, a smile playing about his mouth as the tension between them eases.

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

In seminary, he had no problem with the mental discipline of prayer. His mind was a finely tuned instrument used to the rhythm of poetry and verse, the beat of his heart, and the cadence of argument.

He loved learning then and now. But he doesn't love the content of what he's learning any longer. It isn't the technical problem solving inherent in ballistics, DNA sampling, forensics. He doesn't love knowing the depths of the human heart, doesn't want to know the depravity that man is capable of. He never did.

His mind is too full of knowledge. Too full of everything, really.

He sees dead people.

Sounds trite, but it's true. He glanced in that box on the floor beside Robbie's desk. Unsolved cases. The palpable despair of cases that go nowhere written in the inspector's case notes.

And there are the cases they've solved and—it's too much. Bludgeoned bodies, stabbings, shootings. He's become inured to the violence.

_Can't feel anything anymore. Except for an instant out on the allotment where I felt something I haven't felt before. Something I shouldn't._

He begins to gather his belongings, thinks of what he'll need to pack for a long walk. Drags his rucksack and sleeping bag from the closet.

So easy to empty his mind when he was younger because there was so little in it then.

So hard to do it now.

Now he hangs around on the edge of effectiveness, not sure he makes a difference.

He opens his laptop, accesses a website, starts making travel arrangements.

While the system searches, he contemplates Robbie retiring. He's not sure he can even do the job without Robbie at his side. Technically, yes, he's adept, reading crime scenes like an expert.

He has no doubt that he could pass OSPRE. No doubt he'd make a good Inspector, if he wanted.

Not sure he wanted to do it without Robbie, though. Can't imagine doing it without Robbie, in fact.

He tries to remember a time when he didn’t work with Robbie.

Tries to remember the basic goodness of humanity.

Tries to remember a time when he felt good about himself.

He buys his tickets, orders a few things he'll need for the journey, spends more than he planned. He lays clothes on the bed, eliminating about half. He'll need to pack light for the Camino.

**Spain—Camino Frances—On the Way to Burgos—Past**

Two weeks of wallowing. Almost five weeks, technically, though those first three weeks were a blur.

_Wherever you go, there you are._

He can't go on like this. Time to get to work.

He's practiced meditation, of course. On occasion. Tai-chi, yoga, chanting, deep throat singing (but only briefly in seminary as a joke).

Prayer.

He's been watching other _peregrinos_ prepare each morning: stretches, sun screen, examination for rubbing socks, blue toenails, calluses, red spots, swelling feet. Application of artificial skin, socks and Crocs, wraps and braces.

And then there's the moment of deep breathing and connecting to the Way before setting off.

Walking meditation, then. First, he must be aware of his body.

 _Shit, I ache all over._ He needs to sit down. _No, wait. Stance._ He aligns himself, feels the pain in his feet, ankles, knees, hips, back. When has he ever felt pain in his hips? He's favoring his left side. _Good to know. Probably means something deep and profound._

_Which side does Robbie usually walk on?_

Adjusts his rucksack. _Lighter. No longer chafes. Good._

He settles into his spine, accepts his height, takes a deep breath and notices that he either tucks in his chin or extends his neck or— _Fuck, I must look like a damn bird._

_Right. Now, walk._

The silliness makes him smile.

He's aware of his feelings. _Vedana._ He is mindful of his silly bird movements. He notices his aches, his pains. It is all contributing to his _citta_ —his heart and mind—emotional states that he can choose, because with that choice comes freedom, he tells himself.

The thought that I can ever be free of this self-imposed hell is ludicrous, he tells himself. I need serious cognitive behavioral therapy and an anti-depressant, he tells himself. I wonder if anyone else has noticed all the butterflies along the Camino, he tells himself.

He is being followed by butterflies.

Orange butterflies with wings outlined in black like leaded windows in a church. Thirty, forty butterflies. There's no one else walking nearby, no one to ask. It's identical to the butterfly Anna captured in a photo.

Just—butterflies all along the edge of the path fluttering about beside him, keeping pace with him as he moves.

He slows, then halts. A butterfly lands on his arm, and then another.

It's a blessing, he thinks, feeling the imperceptible touch of wings and legs against his skin. Nothing short of miraculous.

And he realizes then, just at that moment, that he is in the moment. He doesn't need to call Robbie or take a photo or do anything other than stand in the warm sunlight with a butterfly.

And with that the butterflies are gone, flying off into the field.

He doesn't have a problem being mindful after that.

**Oxford—Present**

"Monarch butterflies?" Robbie asks.

The corner of James's mouth curls up. "Well done, you. Closet entomologist?"

"Saw them in the BVI. Hundreds would migrate. Never had one land on me, though." Robbie smiles, wonderingly. "What's that feel like, then, having a butterfly land on you?"

"I had several. It feels—" He stops, not sure how this information will be received.

Robbie waits. Seeming to be curious, but patient.

"It felt like a blessing," James says, softly.

"Deserved it, to my mind."


	10. Chapter 10

**Spain—Camino Frances—Burgos—Past**

There's a silence on the road now that connects those on the Way. Speech is hushed, infrequent. At night in the _albergues_ , he hears philosophical discussions between the _peregrinos_. His Spanish is improving. His stamina, too. He is covering 25 klicks a day, sometimes more, though he tells himself he's not in a hurry to the end of the world in Finisterre.

He had set out on this walk to Santiago to cool his thoughts, quench the fire in his heart, and contemplate his immortal soul.

Instead, his day to day existence is focused on his breathing, the state of his feet, and his gut.

It feels surreal. All he can think about is putting one foot in front of the other at this point, making a bit of progress each day.

It feels amazing. With each footstep, he feels his mind clear.

He keeps to himself, as he always has.

He misses his iPhone. Misses having apps that translate, that map directions, that provide the history of the churches along the Camino. Misses the ease of instant information via the internet. Misses having a camera.

Misses Robbie. Misses Laura. Misses his guitar.

He always walks alone.

There are moments when he is alone on the road and he sings. He tells himself that it is to keep himself awake. It isn’t that. He misses making music.

Misses making Robbie listen to his music. Misses the derisive snort from Robbie that accompanies Gregorian chants. Misses hearing the sound of Laura practicing her clarinet in the background when he talks with Robbie over the phone.

Misses Jean Innocent. Misses a few guys in his band. Misses Gurdip and Julie and even Hooper.

He doesn't miss Peterson. Not at all.

Misses Monty. Misses hot water, sheets, privacy, sleep. Misses Great Tom and all the bells of Oxford.

Misses Robbie.

It always comes back to missing Robbie.

And when he notices that Robbie has cycled through his thoughts again, he mentally hugs the man and moves on, knowing that as he walks the Way, the thought of Robbie will be there when he turns to look back.

A warm breeze carrying the scent of lavender and sage, brushes against his cheek, almost a caress. Everywhere he looks, patches of sunflowers follow the path of the sun.

At one point, he comes across a group of pilgrims singing in harmony: "Dona Nobis Pacem" in the middle of summer. It’s enthusiastic, if a little off-key. He envies them their easy camaraderie. One of the men waves him forward, " _Venire cantare!_ "

James shakes his head, but their pace slows to include him. He finds himself harmonizing with them on old folk-rock songs that he had recently put onto a CD at Robbie’s request. He learns the song sung at the end of the Camino, too.

It’s a delightful afternoon, cut short as they take a different path from his own.

As they part, he wonders to himself why he doesn’t go with them. He has no timetable. Nowhere to be. He’s free to follow them.

Two hours later, he is thinking the same thought. _Why am I alone? Why didn’t I go with them?_ He backtracks. Because he was caught up in the singing and following a group, he gets lost.

He listens, but he doesn't hear them. The only sounds he hears are cicadas.

He spends the night alone on a hilltop near a cornfield. He makes a meal of bread, white hard cheese, yet another orange. And Coke, the drink of the pilgrim.

He would kill for a cup of tea. He lies on the hard ground, his pack as a pillow. The dry smell of corn stalks and manure taint the air. He thinks of thousands of pilgrims throughout time who have made their bed on this ground. He hopes he isn't awakened by cows in the morning. Hopes he isn't trespassing.

The moon is in its last quarter. He names the constellations; finds Sirius, Betelgeuse, Polaris. The sky is so full of stars he can see the Milky Way leading toward Santiago.

Because he has consulted the stars, he knows which way to go in the morning.

And he knows he will find solace in Burgos at the Abbey.

**Spain—Camino Frances—Burgos—Monasterio de Santo Domingo de Silos—Past**

Eleventh century cloisters, carved panels of the Doubting Thomas, Biblical scenes, the scriptorium, the historical pharmacy, the Missal of Silos—the oldest Western manuscript on paper: it's a masterpiece of Romanesque architecture.

And in the midst of it on a stone wall is a modern EMI gold record mounted in a square of acrylic received by the monks for their album, _Chant._

James registers for two nights of reflection, meals. Only men may stay at the monastery. He's given a small plain room, a comfortable bed, meals. Time to pray, to heal. An opportunity to attend Mass, to sing, minister to the others spending time at the abbey.

He spends time in the library that first day, seeking solace in the smell of parchment and leather-bound books. Open stairs lead to wooden bookshelves stacked thirty feet high along the walls—a life-size crucifix mounted on the far wall watches over the library, Jesus Christ's visage vaguely threatening. He finds the old computers incongruous on the old scriptorium tables, the cables running against 11th century stone amusing. The monks are apologetic—they are digitizing their materials as quickly as possible, trying to maintain and spread knowledge just as they had centuries before.

Some things never change.

He wonders if he will.

That evening, he attends a very small Maundy—a foot washing and blessing—after Mass. It's one of several throughout the abbey.

"Our Savior instructed that as you washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet." The monk smiles warmly. " 'A servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.' " The monk gives a slight bow and leads the twelve men through the cloisters, their sandaled footsteps echoing against carved pillars hundreds of years old.

They do not walk in step.

Of course James has done this before during Holy Week. It is a gesture of hospitality common to many cultures, a Benedictine practice since the 6th century. He has always volunteered to serve in this fashion.

Six wooden chairs are set in an outdoor stone grotto lit by candles. Night blooming jasmine scents the warm evening air.

They file in. The first six sit in the chairs, the others kneel at their feet. To James's left is a steel basin, a towel, and a pair of disposable gloves. He considers the man in the chair.

"HIV. If you don't feel comfortable, I understand," says the man in accented English. He is bony thin, pale, and seems older than James by a decade or more. But he can't be. He's wearing a concert T-shirt from a recent tour of a new, as-yet-unknown independent band.

This man could have been Will. Could have been JonJo. Could have been himself, come to that, if he happened to like this sort of music.

James puts on the gloves and smiles slightly. His touch is gentle, supportive. _This man is walking with God,_ he thinks. He takes the man's foot and sees that the foot is clean, but damaged by hundreds of kilometers of hard walking. Blisters, some bloody and raw. Missing a toenail. He bathes the foot tenderly, watching the water go red. "This foot needs medical attention." He dabs the foot dry and takes the other, feeling the other man tense as he does so. He glances up.

The man is crying, hand covering his face. Not in pain.

Agony.

James finishes, sitting back on his heels, drying his hands. He places his hands gently on the man's hand, comforting. "I saw butterflies on the Camino," he says quietly. "Hundreds of orange butterflies."

The man dragged his other hand beneath his eyes, wiping his tears. "Monarch butterflies. They like milkweed at the side of the road."

"What about Japanese knotweed?"

The man shrugs. "Don't know. Milkweed, though." He straightens in his seat.

James feels a gentle hand on his shoulder, turns to see an older man looking fondly at the younger. There's a resemblance between the two—brothers, perhaps.

"I think he'll need help to the infirmary," the monk says.

James and the brother help the young man to his feet and, seeing that he cannot walk, make a chair of their joined arms, joking that he'll come to expect this along the Camino from now on. Always being carried. James helps the monks in the infirmary and the brother to get the man settled.

He returns to the grotto to help clean up the basins and towels, but everything has been cleared. The monk comes up behind him, carrying a fresh basin, a towel. He invites James to sit down. The outdoor grotto is empty, save for James and the monk.

"No, it's fine," James says quietly to the monk.

The monk gestures James into the chair and then kneels before him, taking his foot.

James has not had his feet washed by anyone since he was very small. He managed to avoid it in seminary and during Holy Week services for years.

To his mind, it feels far more humbling to submit to having one's feet washed than it does to wash the feet of another.

He admits this quietly to the monk, who smiles and shrugs. "I feel the same. That is why so much of my life is spent on my knees."

"I once wanted to spend my life in service to others," James says.

"What makes you think you are not doing so now?" The monk pats his foot dry, takes the other. It is oddly intimate. "Once you are called by God you have no choice but to answer. Perhaps you are not answering as you once did, but you cannot help but listen since you have already been called."

"I think I've stopped listening."

The monk rose and smiled. "You would not be walking the Camino if you were not listening."

The next morning James wanders through the gardens, sees the famous cypress tree, the statues. Nods politely at monks who sit in quiet contemplation. He is standing in a stone courtyard, listening to birdsong and staring at a clump of greenery beyond a vegetable garden of tomatoes and marigolds. The plants are tall with mature, wide heart shaped leaves and long, delicate stalks of tiny white flowers. A man is walking through the furrows in the garden, dropping to one knee occasionally to pick off tomato worms, dig out a weed.

He comes up to James and smiles. "Do you have a cigarette?"

James raises an eyebrow. The man's accent is American. He gives the man a cigarette, lights one himself. "Is that knotweed, back there?"

The man nods. "It is. Brought to the monastery as an ornamental plant—it's a pretty plant. The monks will tell you that constant prayer is keeping it at bay."

"Does that work?"

The man shrugs. "God has provided rocks and minerals in the soil here along the courtyard. Perhaps years of building have created a chemical composition similar to glyphosate--a weed killer. Perhaps the monks have not noticed judicious use of that substance over the years. Knotweed is a useful plant. Full of vitamins. Roots the size of your fist though." The man finished his cigarette, dropped it to the ground, crushed it out and picked up the butt. "You know your heart is the same size as your fist?"

James quirks a smile. He puts out his cigarette in the same way and puts the butt in his pocket. "'Course it is," he says ironically.

**Oxford—Present**

"Sounds like you enjoyed being with the monks."

James nods. His cigarette has burned down. He stubs it out, adding it to the rest. Smoking too much, he thinks. "Wouldn't care to be one, however."

"Reckon you'd rather be a friar since they get about."

"Look at you, remembering the difference." Feeling pleased, James adds, "Plenty of opportunity to serve my fellow man without taking vows, though." He folds his hands.

Perhaps this will help explain—"I always felt I was suited for the Church." He brings his hand to his mouth, as if he unconsciously wants to silence his words, but they come out anyway. "I didn’t fit in, though I tried." He ducks his head, a little embarrassed. "Bit of a smart arse then."

"Oh, really? Who'd have thought?" Robbie grins, enjoying the moment, and then his expression fades as if understanding something important is in the offing here.

_He isn't asking me why I left, isn't pushing for more answers. He has to know this at least about me, and we have spoken of this before. I know I remember shouting at him, trying to get him to listen to me, to understand. I know he remembers, too. He should know all of it._

"Being a priest would have had advantages. Plenty of time to read." James ticks each item off on his long fingers, looking at a point over Robbie's shoulder, casting about for something to pad the bit of truth Robbie needs to hear. "The consolation of solitude. The dashing uniform. The captive audience on Sundays to listen to my sage words." He smirks, disarmingly. "Celibacy was never a problem for me. And I knew all the words to the music."

_There. Is that enough, I wonder? To explain what I couldn't explain when he asked me years ago if I was gay or straight?_

Robbie's eyebrows furrow for an instant. He drops his gaze to the table, then back up to James, as if he understands the cost of this personal admission. "Glad you decided on a different uniform, James." His voice is soft. "As for the—whatdyacallit—consolation of solitude? Not happening. I'm always going to be around." He rubs his ear, drops his hand to the table, close to James's hand. Almost, but not quite touching. He grins, then, and raps the table. "Right. What happened next?"


	11. Chapter 11

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

Jean Innocent holds up a finger as James enters her office. She's on the phone, listening, lips pressed together. She gestures for him to sit down.

"That's not acceptable."

James stares at the commendations on her wall. A plaque or two. The picture of her son in police uniform and his dog. There are no pictures of the elusive Mr. Innocent, though that may be a matter of showing a proper dedication to the job rather than any emotional detachment.

"No. I've put in for a detective inspector position—I don't need another detective sergeant. Well, I don't have anyone to mentor a DS at the moment."

James's eyes follow the straight line of frames to the credenza, which is set with tea things, thinking that a cuppa would be nice. His gaze travels down to the electrical outlet which sits above the connection to the phone…

…Which is not connected. He tracks the cord back up to the instrument itself, which has to be completely dead. Yet Innocent is holding it and nodding as if she is having a conversation.

_Why isn't she simply pretending to talk on another line? Why not disconnect her phone at her desk?_

_Why make it so bloody obvious?_

He bites his lip, trying not to laugh. She's going on about how Oxfordshire is desperate for a detective inspector. Talking up her current detective sergeant, who is not named. _Of course._

He meets her eyes and glances significantly at the end of the cable which is some distance from the wall.

"I've got to go," Innocent says with aplomb to the non-existent person on the other end.

James nods slowly, watching her blush.

"Have I changed your mind about how good a detective you are?"

James shakes his head slowly, mouth curling up at the corners.

"Out of my office, then."

James bends, picks up the phone cable, holds it up for her examination, and plugs it back into the receptacle. He smiles at her pleasantly.

"Need a DI, not a bloody phone repairman!" she says loudly as he leaves.

**_Fallopia japonica_ Notebook**

**_Because of the length of time required for effective eradication… One option is to treat the knotweed as Dracula, and bury it underground, sealed up within an unbreakable membrane. A more visible solution is to imprison the knotweed within a sort of cage, known as Mesh Tech, and slowly kill off the plant through lack of potassium, plus a gradual snapping, wilting and crushing against the metal mesh. —Newsweek, July 5, 2014_ **

**Spain—Camino Frances—Leon—Astorga—Past**

After a siesta in the late afternoon, he sits at a _pied a terra,_ listening to the other seekers of truth. For four Euro he has coffee, buttered toast—a _desayuno_ meal, but at the end of the day. He would have preferred ice cream. He sits at the grubby table wearily.

It's been a hard day of walking. Hot, dusty. Pebbles—small, round, and slippery—make traction difficult. The road, though dry and hard, seems deep. It is like walking miles in sand. The heat causes the illusion of water in the distance ahead.

He closes his eyes, resting his head back against the wall behind his seat. Listens to the news from up and down the Camino.

"She was drugged, I heard. He tied her hands with those ropes of bells, left her barely alive as they—" the woman can't go on.

"Hemlock leaves, that's what it was. In tea."

"I just hope they catch him. Had to fly her back home—Colombia?"

"British Columbia."

James sits up, alert. "What happened?"

The woman shakes her head. "She shouldn't have been traveling alone—"

"What happened?" James uses his interrogation voice and inhales sharply. "Sorry. She—do you know her name?"

"No. She was from, where was it? Victoria? No, Vancouver."

James feels sick, can feel the blood leaving his face. Jesus, everyone he comes into contact with dies or— He motions for the woman to go on.

"She was assaulted. I don't know for sure if she was, you know—" the woman says, flapping her hand ineffectually, "—raped. One hears things and hopes they aren't true, but she was definitely assaulted. Beaten, I heard. Robbed, of course."

James gets up without a word, stumbles outside where the sun is just beginning its descent. He crosses the road to a hotel, feeling unreal and numb. Digs out the note he's been carrying with Anna's phone number. Pays an outrageous sum to make a phone call. It goes to voice mail. He slumps against the counter as he rings off. The desk clerk gives him a look as he takes back the phone.

The phone rings. The concierge listens for a moment and then hands the phone to James.

"This is a surprise," says Anna, sounding puzzled, concerned.

"I heard a Canadian woman was left for dead at the side of the road," he says, belatedly wincing at the choice of words. _Too long a copper._

"Not me, but yeah. I heard that poor woman was poisoned, but that she recovered."

"I heard she was tied up, beaten, robbed. Possibly raped."

"Oh, God. And you thought it was me?"

There's a long pause. He's not sure what to say. He wanted to make sure she was all right, wanted to make sure he wasn't somehow responsible, wanted—he isn't sure what he wanted, really, now that he has her on the line.

"Yeah," he admits.

"Hathaway? How's your Camino?" Her voice is gentle.

 _Lonely. Frustrating. Painful._ "Fine. I'm in San Justo."

"I'm nearly at Villafranca del Bierzo. How did you get so far behind?"

"Stayed at Burgos, the Abbey of Santo Domingo de Silos. You won't have heard—"

" _Chant._ "

"Excuse me?"

" _Chant._ Got it on my iPhone."

 _This is unexpected._ "Um. I'm on a hotel phone. When are you leaving?"

"Nine days to Santiago—keep telling myself I'm almost there. Erm. I left your book at the _albergue_ in Ponferrada. Told them to keep an eye out for you."

He wants to ask her to wait for him. But no one waits for him. No one ever has. He sighs. "Ta. Yeah. Glad you're all right."

There's another long pause. Why was he thinking he could talk with her? That she was his responsibility?

"Buen Camino, James," she says softly.

"Buen Camino."

He goes back to the _pied a terra,_ buys a bottle of wine and settles in to get drunk. He never asked her about music. They had walked for hours, almost in step, and they hadn't talked about music. Or anything truly, deeply important.

Another missed opportunity. Too often he ignores the opportunity to connect with someone.

The wine here has that exceptional vanilla characteristic from being aged in oak barrels, says one of the men at the table to the others.

James notices that the alcohol content is the same, though, despite the nose. He tops up the glasses of the pilgrims around him, for that it is how it is done on the Way. He feels he should thank them for making him feel guilty enough to call Anna for this final bit of humiliation, but he notices that the woman who gave him the news and her companion are gone.

One man is talking of getting another shell tattooed to his calf—there are three there already that he shows off proudly. It’s important to mark the journey in some way, important to have something to take home with you besides a little card and a souvenir scallop, says the man. You must carry this state of mind with you wherever you go.

 _Yes,_ James thinks, sarcastically, _I want to think of confusion, pain and bleak despair._

Another speaks of totem animals. You’ll either see your totem at sunrise or at sunset, he says, as the world changes from night to day or day to night. Recognize the change in the light, recognize your animal.

 _My animal,_ James thinks, _would be an ass._

"So, is a totem animal like a patronus, then?" giggles a young woman.

James gives her a disgusted glance that seems to put her off. Then he feels bad, because he isn’t usually this ill-tempered. They are all walking for self-discovery, aren’t they?

Or for penance. Or redemption. Or to forget.

Or perhaps he is the only one walking for those reasons. Can’t really get close to people. They try to set you ablaze or you have to arrest them as an accessory to murder. Or they leave you for a job.

Or for someone else.

Or they just leave.

Or he does. _Was it a mistake to leave the way I did?_

He’s had a staggeringly bad success rate with people, really. So he doesn’t care to ask anyone why they are on this road. He’s not here to question anyone. He doesn’t do that anymore.

He wonders if he ever did it well. Intruding on a person’s life or death. It suddenly seems too personal.

He is reminded that he once wanted to listen to people’s sins, wanted to beg for God’s forgiveness on their behalf.

His first journey along the Camino had been so very different. He was a different person then, full of faith in God. In himself.

Just when he thinks he understands why he is broken, he is crushed a little more.

He goes outside for a smoke. Takes a stroll up the road to clear his head of wine and laughter. Takes a pee. He is walking up the hill along the center of an old, narrow paved road. At the top of the hill, he was told, he’ll be able to see the distance to be traveled in the morning. Astorga awaits him with its confectionary shops, a Gaudi edifice filled with art, and, most important, a cyber café.

He should email Robbie and Laura. He hasn't even sent a postcard.

The air is quiet and still near nightfall, a dampness creeping into the end of the day. The sun is low in a peach sky tinting wisps of clouds purple; the moon will rise soon. Crickets begin their nighttime music.

Along the road in the gully he sees the glint of eyes low to the ground, the rustle of greenery. A small head raises and looks directly at him.

A fox.

Another set of eyes. A second fox.

The two animals stare at him. A dare. Their eyes are golden and still. Then they vanish into the brush.

He takes a step toward them. An electric car swoops down the rise of the road silently, narrowly missing him as he dives into the roadside bramble.

The bramble is comprised of Spanish broom, mallow, and Japanese knotweed.

The driver pulls aside, apologetic in French. He didn’t see, didn’t expect—is James all right? The driver explains that he has just got a tattoo and it hurts like hell. He was distracted, he’s terribly sorry…

James dusts himself off, ignoring tiny scratches on his arms and legs. "Where’s the tattoo shop?"

The driver gives him directions.

The next day James has a stylized sword of St. James with a scallop tattooed to his upper arm and two foxes tattooed on the spot classically known as "the heart."

He's cautioned against doing so much at one time. He's afraid if he doesn't take the initiative to do it now, he never will.

Seeing the red fox increases focus and determination, the tattoo artist tells him. Foxes teach us to adapt to our surroundings, to blend in, to use our intelligence to hide, and to keep secrets, the tattoo artist tells him. This may hurt, the tattoo artist tells him.

It does. Far more than the tattoo on his upper arm.

It is a terrifically stupid idea, getting a tattoo to care for in such an unhygienic environment. He can almost hear Laura chastising him. What were you thinking?

He wasn't. He thinks too much, he decides. The sound of his thoughts drown out the voices of others so much so that he no longer listens.

In his mind—after a bottle of wine consumed at _comida_ afterwards-- he names one fox Robbie and the other James. James has a slightly longer tail, which he finds very funny. His inane giggling is what makes the _hospitalero_ turn him away at the _albergue_.

He finds a nice hotel. After being reassured that they do have hot water and electricity both, he runs up the stairs. Feels idiotically grateful to be given a room with a phone, a television set and a bath en suite.

His own bathroom. With its own shower.

He remembers, belatedly, that he shouldn't be this thrilled about the prospect of hot water, soap, and a real toilet. Remembers, too, that he isn't supposed to get the dressing on his tattoo wet.

There's a huge bath, though.

He takes the first bubble bath he's had in decades.

And marvels at the layer of mud that remains in the bath as it drains.

He pulls the dressing from the tattoo and gawks in the bathroom mirror. He smiles to himself, thinking that now, truly, if Robbie goes, he goes. He no longer walks alone.

_I've had too much wine. Naming my tattoos to keep me company._

Walking the next day, the shoulder strap of his backpack rubs painfully on the edge of the new tattoo. The pain of his heart, broken and sharp, is dulled by the splintering pain of the tattoo. Over the kilometers, both resolve to a dull ache. Noticeable, but not insurmountable. He marvels at his resilience.

When one experiences layers of pain, the suffering becomes more manageable.

This is the second lesson on the journey.

**Oxford—Present**

"Wondered about the critters."

"The critters?" James replies, the corners of his mouth curling. "I'll have you know those are works of art."

Robbie gives a derisive snort. "Had to have been dead drunk to have those penned on. Worst looking tats I've ever seen."

"I'll thank you not to disparage my ink. And I'd like to see you get one, come to that."

Robbie takes a sip of his orange juice. "How do you know I don't have one?"

"Do you?" _This is intriguing._

Robbie gets up. "Conversation like this, I'm gonna need a drink. Same again for you?"

"Please. Well, do you?" James calls after him. "Does Laura?"

Robbie gives a wave of his hand, which could mean anything, James supposes.


	12. Chapter 12

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

James never cared much about things in the ground when he was young. He told himself and everyone else that it was because he thought only of heaven, but really it was because he didn't like getting dirty. And it wasn't so much getting dirty as it was his dad telling him he was making extra work for his mum when he grubbed about in the dirt at the estate.

Though he wanted to, he never played very much in that morning glory bower that his aunt and mother made for him.

Now he sees things buried all the time, between bodies dumped in the woods and digging at the allotment. He has three small white rocks on his dresser that he picked up at the allotment from the last time he was there.

There were tiny shells in them. Fossiliferous limestone, according to Google. Similar rocks accumulated over time to become the chalk white cliffs of Dover.

It is the constant movement of saltwater over stone that makes sand. It is the constant movement of saltwater over shellfish that makes chalk. It is the constant flow of saltwater that arrests the growth of Japanese knotweed.

It is the constant flow of saltwater in the form of tears that heals a broken heart.

He thinks of all of these things, but it comes down to this: Robbie handed him the rocks that day at the allotment and he put them in his pocket.

Therein lies their significance.

**Spain—Camino Frances—Cruz de Ferro of Foncebadon—Past**

James reaches the "roof of the Way" after a stiff climb up Monte Irago, originally the site of a Roman altar dedicated to the god Mercury, guardian of boundaries. Ancient Iberians cast stones here to placate the gods. For centuries pilgrims would leave a rock behind from their homeland symbolizing the deliverance from sin afforded by the pilgrimage. The Iron Cross itself sits atop a tall wooden pole.

The modern pilgrim has marked the site in the usual fashion: rocks, painted rocks, glow in the dark rocks, empty water bottles, Coke cans, scarves, stuffed animals, rubbish, a used condom, and, inexplicably, a crushed Kindle.

The Cruz de Ferro is revered to the extent that pilgrims pray on their knees beneath it. Most, however, are stumbling around through the rocks exclaiming about the mess before climbing into their cars and driving away. A child's birthday party is being held at a nearby picnic table.

And, while mountains can be seen in the distance as they have been for centuries, James also sees giant electrical towers marching across the landscape. He wonders what Cervantes would think. At the end of the day, he'll reach Ponferrada where Anna has left _Don Quixote_ for him.

He burrows into his rucksack. Before leaving Oxford, he put several small stones in there to leave along the Camino. On his first journey, he’d never left anything of himself behind.

Perhaps if he had, he thinks, he would have remained connected to God.

He selects a tiny, pale, sedimentary rock from his stash and leaves it carefully with the others. It is a deliberate action, this leaving a part of himself behind. But he doesn’t want to look at it that way.

He doesn’t want to equate his action with any New Age doctrine or pressing psychological need for change or atonement or introspection. Not anymore. He did that for the first hundred kilometers.

It’s just a rock. He’s leaving it there. It makes his burden lighter to do so.

At least, today, that is what he is telling himself.

**Spain—Camino Frances—Ponferrada—Past**

Red poppies and sunflowers line the Way near Ponferrada. There is only one _albergue_. But it's big.

James recognizes the Dutch pilgrims as he approaches – they all have long strings of tiny bells tied to their backpacks.

"Is it too early to queue?" he asks in French.

They nod, going back to their beer at a long table outside beneath red canopies advertising Coca-Cola.

James takes off his hat, his sunglasses, and wipes his feet before he enters the _albergue_. This behavior is noticed by those sitting at the table. He feels their gaze as he enters.

It takes a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the darkness inside. The _hospitalero_ sits at a table drinking Coke. Along the wall are strings of pilgrim shells, Templar crosses, and packages of plasters. Strings of bells, just two euro, are laid out on the table along with posters of "The Game of the Goose." James ignores the merchandise and asks in Spanish, "When does the queue open?"

"Too early," replies the _hospitalero_ in the same language. She doesn't look up from her book.

"Yes, of course. A friend may have left a book for me here. My name's Hathaway."

"This book?" says the woman, holding up the book she's reading. _Don Quixote_. "It's him!" she hollers out the door in English.

The Dutch enter en masse to stare at him.

He smiles is slight, wary, uncertain. "Hi," he says.

What have you got against the Dutch, they ask him in French. What's the answer to question nine, they ask him in English. Who are you to make fun of our sacred traditions of worshipping ducks and smoking hemlock, they ask him in Spanish.

"Excuse me?"

The _hospitalero_ raises her hand and thumps the table. "Stop it, all of you." She holds the book just out of his reach. "Are you really a spy?"

"No. Look, my Spanish isn't very good yet—"

"Then you won't need this." She continued to hold onto the book.

"It's not mine," he insists. "It belongs to a friend. I need to return it."

"Laura?" intones one of the Dutch women archly, indicating the name written on the inside cover.

James's eyes widen. _What's this, then?_ He bites his lower lip. _It's a bloody book. What did Anna say to these people?_ He frowns. "May I have the book Anna left for me, please?"

"Who's Laura?" asks the _hospitalero_.

"What?" James can't believe this.

"Probably his old girlfriend," says the Dutch woman.

"Hmph. Doesn't look the type," says a man quietly.

James isn't going to indulge anyone's curiosity. He meets the man's eyes coldly until the fellow looks away.

"My book. Please." He holds out his hand across the table.

The woman hands over the book. He inclines his head in thanks and turns to leave. He can't stay here, not after this—there must be a hotel in town.

"She said you'd help us." One of the women is wringing her hands.

He pauses. Turns back. "If I can, I will."

The _hospitalero_ beams at him. "I knew it! Of course he'll help!"

And suddenly everyone wants to hear the story of how he met Anna because Anna has left him a note! And such a wonderful note—they've all read it!

The _hospitalero_ hands him a rumpled "Game of the Goose" poster.

With a sinking feeling, he unrolls the poster, believing he'll find a long letter detailing his spectacular failure that night at the hotel. Instead, on the back, he finds "The Game of the Gander, written by A. Goose for James Hathaway." Anna's handwriting is more print than cursive, a combination of angles and loops. There are fifteen clues, the Dutch pilgrims point out over his shoulder, and each succeeding clue is dependent upon the answer to the previous clue—

Clues?

It's a game, a puzzle, a treasure hunt--they've been all over the city, playing the game she wrote for him. Each day another group of pilgrims tries to finish the game. Look, the scores are at the bottom. Look, the group from the day before must be idiots not to know that the figure of the Virgin was hidden in the tree trunk. Look, this bunch didn't even bother to look in the House of Shields.

Yes, the _hospitalero_ says, but they were Americans. And then they got into their car and left.

Everyone finds this uproarious. The Americans bought five annoying strings of bells—despite the warning in Galician: "These bells annoy everyone but the Dutch."

But they need his help, they insist. They cannot complete the game because they can't answer question nine. It's become their quest.

James is encouraged to leave his rucksack—of course there is room for him, he has to answer question nine before the Templar Castle closes at 18.00!

He is dumbstruck and grinning. He grabs the poster and rushes out, followed by new-found friends and well-wishers, all of whom have been waiting for the tall, blond Englishman to arrive to finish the puzzle.

It's an artificial looking castle, he thinks, somewhat small and overly crenellated. Still, it dominates the hill, the nearby plain, and the river Sil, which was its original purpose.

Now it is a tourist attraction with costumed Templars wearing long white tabards marked with crimson crosses. There are educational displays and a gift shop. Flags, shells, wooden swords.

The group asks to be re-admitted—the tall, blond Englishman has arrived! He must answer question nine, please!

Question nine: What is significant about the towers?

Not their height, not their circumference, not their placement in relationship to the square, the river, or the Basilica. And it can't be the number of towers because we've already checked the clock tower, so it's not a time or a direction. Could it be something to do with chess?

They are standing in front of an acrylic covered map of the castle detailing ruins, excavation, additions, restoration.

And as he stares at question ten and eleven, he knows the answer to question nine. It reminds him of the Folly at Crevecoeur.

"What else numbered twelve in those days?" Hathaway asks. Then he waits. He sees that his small group of followers has grown. He's stunned to find himself enjoying the game, amazed to find himself smiling easily. "The Zodiac. Each tower depicts a zodiac sign. What is the ninth sign?"

"Sagittarius. The archer—oh. The arches. The answer to number ten is McDonald's."

Hathaway nods.

"We need to get to McDonald's!"

James hesitates. He'd like to see more of the castle, despite its touristy milieu, but he can do that tomorrow. Tonight he'll help them finish the puzzle.

He goes to McDonald's and has a spicy pork burger while they talk about the game. The final answer is 42, which he has to explain to them. It doesn't escape James's notice that the answer to the puzzle is an absurd reference to the meaning of life.

It's a bit of a letdown, they decide. He borrows a mobile trying to reach Anna. Not getting an answer, he asks the pilgrims leaving early tomorrow to pass a message to her along the Camino thanking her for the game.

"Could you ask her to leave her email address for me at the first _albergue_ in O Cebrecio?"

They assure him that word will be passed along the Camino: the tall blond Englishman solved the puzzle.

Then the conversation turns to the number of thefts along the Camino this season. Everyone knows someone who's been robbed.

**Oxford—Present**

"You went to Spain to eat at McDonald's." Robbie raises his eyebrows. "You don't eat at McDonald's here."

"I did a lot of things in Spain that I don't do here."

Robbie nods. "Got that. Anna," he says, raising an eyebrow.

James rolls his eyes. "Yeah, well. And pork rinds. _Tocino._ The Spanish eat all parts of the pig, which is very noble of them. When you go into a Spanish butcher shop, you'll see lines of baby pigs peeking over the counter at you. Adorable, really. They do, in fact, have little hairs on their chinny chin chins. Nothing like biting into crackling and getting pig hair between your teeth. New meaning to the word, 'Floss.' "

"Lizzie likes them." Robbie laughs, sips his beer.

"She has an iron-clad stomach."

"Speaking of stomachs, I've seen you eat haggis."

"Not willingly. And I certainly wasn't anxious to eat an over-priced McDonald's pork burger, either. Some meals on the Camino were better than others. Some were far worse."

**_Fallopia japonica_ Notebook**

**_Dandy Knotweed Muffins - Makes 16 large muffins_ **

**_Japanese knotweed stalks to measure 2 cups, minced; 1.5 cups flour; 0.5 cup dandelion flower petals, stripped from their base (do not include any green parts); 1 teaspoon baking powder; 1 teaspoon baking soda; 0.5 cup softened butter; 1 cup light brown sugar; 2 eggs; 1 teaspoon vanilla; 1 cup sour cream or yogurt. Snip off the pointy tops of the knotweed stalks and mince. Combine flour, dandelions, baking powder, and baking soda in a small bowl. Cream 0.5 cup butter with 1 cup brown sugar until fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time and then add the vanilla. To this mix, alternately fold in the sour cream and dry ingredients until blended. Fold in the knotweed pieces. Divide the batter into greased muffin forms. Bake at 350˚F for 15 to 20 minutes, until the muffins test done in the center. Note: This recipe might have a laxative effect. —Eat The Invaders, Fighting Invasive Species, One Bite at a Time: Japanese Knotweed._ **

**Spain—Camino Frances—Triacastle—Melide—Samos Monastery—Past**

Now, weeks since his first encounter with Anna, James is in a monastery again, one of hundreds along the Camino. But this one is famous. Samos, destination of pilgrims for hundreds of years.

In the center of the courtyard is a fountain; the sound of water is meditative, pleasant. Its sandstone edge is wide enough for sitting, and so he does, a few feet away from other _peregrinos_ who are doing the same. He hears birdsong and Camino gossip; listens to the cool, soothing sounds of water trickling.

"The bells are to ward off poisons. Someone is poisoning the _peregrinos_ this season. Stay away from eating partridge—there are drugs in the partridge. And watch out for wild poison hemlock when you're doing your business at the side of the road. It'll give you a rash."

James smiles to himself, listening to this garbled thread of information that has made its way along the Camino. Then—

"That old man, the German guy with the Santa Claus beard who lost his wife, I think her name was Gretel? Anyway, he dropped dead on the road past Villafranca. Just clutched his heart and died, right there. Some guy tried to resuscitate him, but he was in his 80s. So sad. Couple of people had been helping him along the way, you know. Carrying his pack for him. Ambulance came and they gave the pilgrim a ride—the guy lost about six hours, sitting with the body."

"If you've got to die, that's a good place to go," says a pilgrim. "Saved him that bitch of a climb up to O Cebrecio."

James closes his eyes, and opens them suddenly, hearing faint, echoing laughter that sends a chill up his spine.

"The old man, do you know his name?" He turns to the pilgrims.

The pilgrim—an American, by his accent—scrunches up his face. "Siegbert. And his wife was Gretel."

"His wife's name was Gerta. She was a teacher," James says, picking up his rucksack.

The American stares at him, as if recognizing him. "Are you the English guy who walked with him to Logrono? He liked you."

James imagines he can see it in the pilgrim's eyes, the accusation, and the question: "Why didn't you keep walking with him?"

James closes his eyes, looks away.

"He called the guys who helped him his angels," the American says. "Heard him talking one night in Villa de Mazariff. Said he was being visited by angels and his wife and he was hoping God would take him on the Camino. He was carrying his wife's ashes to Santiago. Guess he'll go with her now."

"They are saying the rosary in his memory," another pilgrim says, "tomorrow afternoon, I think. Check with the friars."

The bunk bed is hard; his sleeping bag rests on top of well-worn sheets that smell faintly of bleach. The other pilgrims in the dormitory style room are quiet and considerate. For their brief stay, it is a place of silence and contemplation.

Their meal that evening is a simple brown muffin, a vegetable and beef stew, and water.

This is what he expected on his journey.

Some _peregrinos_ will wait for hours to have their card stamped at the small shell-covered church in the village today. It's a "collector's" stamp. He is reminded of Customs entering the country, of having his passport stamped.

As he is not a religious pilgrim, he does not have to wait. Instead, he goes to confession. The pilgrims at the monastery fountain were misinformed—there is no rosary for an old man who died on the Camino.

As he queues for Confession, he is reminded of waiting in line to board a plane. Standing in the small church—there are no pews, only a few chairs in the nave—he is reminded of waiting for his baggage. Except he carries it with him, this heavy burden. As if he has suddenly taken on the rucksack of an old man because he could have done more.

This unintended comparison is not what he expected. This guilt for not doing more for a stranger. His vision of achieving a greater understanding of himself is clouded by this disconnect between reality and expectation.

It is far too warm in this small church. The queue for confession is moving far too slowly. He realizes that his shirt is soaked. His stomach clenches. He doubles over, hurrying outside.

Later, he is in back in the monastery, sitting on the bench outside the building, only a few meters from the public toilets within the monastery walls, too weak to run inside in case he’s hit with another wave of diarrhea. He’s paid for his pants, shirt, socks and trousers to be laundered as he can’t manage to do the washing himself. Everything he owns is soiled. The monks have given him a threadbare black cassock to wear.

Some pilgrims bathe at Monte do Gozo as they prepare for their descent into Santiago—a ritual purification. Others will bathe in the sea at Finisterre and burn their clothes on the beach at the completion of the journey.

Because of the indignities visited upon him, he does not have to wait to arrive at the cathedral to purify himself. It's happening now.

He shouldn’t have drunk the water from a fountain, they tell him. Different organisms, they tell him. Drink wine, they tell him.

He asks about the stew, the seasonings. The muffins. Perhaps he is allergic. They show him dried herbs. But for one, all are familiar. What’s this? It’s good for your heart, for cancer, for pain. It helps the journey, keeps one’s gut from binding. Grows wild. Tastes like rhubarb. Yes, but what is it? _Fallopia japonica_ , they tell him.

Japanese knotweed.

The last time he was this ill, Robbie had come to his flat bringing cold case files and take-away chicken broth. He’d stayed with James, pressing a cold compress on his forehead. Had helped him to the loo and back to bed again. Over and over again. Had even mopped up vomit spattered on the bathroom floor. And, as James began to recover, Robbie had come bearing DVDs and stayed most of the day and into the night, sitting shoulder to shoulder with James on the couch.

Finally, there is nothing left to throw up or shit. He drags himself to the shower in the late afternoon while others eat. A sign advises him to bring his own towel, wear flip flops, and to keep to a two minute shower so that others may have hot water. The water turns suddenly cold moments after he soaps himself.

He returns to the hard bed and rough sheets, exhausted, desiccated. He is allowed to stay a third night. The monks are kind.

In the cold light of morning he learns that one set of his clothes are ruined and have been burned with the rest of the rubbish. The others are still wet, but will dry along the Way. He is given the cassock to complete the pilgrimage and is sent on his way.

He feels unaccountably grateful for the experience.

It is the third lesson of the journey.

**Oxford—Present**

Robbie gives him a sympathetic look. “Worst feeling in the world, the runs. They had to burn your clothes?”

“Yeah. Though the cassock was an expedient way to deal with the problem.”

“Don’t understand the cassock.”

“I had—I was ill for 350 klicks. From Burgos through Samos. Incapacitating in Samos, though. Still had stomach problems in Arzua." He shakes his head slightly, huddling into his clothes, uncomfortable with disclosure. _Wouldn't say a word if it wasn't important to the narrative,_ he thinks. "Going commando beneath a cassock was once a time-honored tradition. When I traveled the Camino as a seminary student, we listened to endless stories of Father Dominick running madly through the field tripping on his robes to avoid charging bulls.”

Robbie makes a face.

James put his elbows on the table and leans forward, his voice barely audible. “Everyone has grand tummy trouble stories, Robbie. It is a mark of great oratory to relate tales of having the trots, as Americans call it. Pilgrims go in cornfields and are chased away by farmers. There used to be great stands of knotweed along the Way to give a bit of privacy. Not any longer. And everybody...” He raises his eyebrows, frowning slightly. It's an uncomfortable subject.

“Jack had a book when he was little called _Everybody Poops._ But my neighbor never said.”

“Signs at the _albergues_ remind everyone to pick up their 'Camino flowers,' as they euphemistically call it." James shudders in distaste. "Pilgrims tell stories that generally have to do with theft of toilet paper from hotels." He folds his hands again. "Being on the Camino makes you focus on basic needs: water, food, sleep, and—" He gives an eloquent shrug.


	13. Chapter 13

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

Jean Innocent hands the letter of resignation back to him. "You’re on unpaid leave. I have too much to do at the moment to handle the paperwork of letting you go."

He puts his hands behind his back, not reaching for it. "Isn’t there more paperwork involved in keeping me on in an unpaid position?"

She shakes the letter at him and then sets it on her desk, pushing it toward him. "Unpaid leave. Two months."

"I don’t think I can do this anymore."

"Have you talked with Robbie?"

He sighs. Before that day at the allotment, he talked with everyone, it seemed. He talked with Robbie. He talked with Laura. He talked and talked and talked. No seem to be listening to him. Everyone wants him to stay.

And now, he needs to go. He absolutely has to leave as soon as possible.

Every day it becomes harder and harder to hide his feelings—he's walking on a razor's edge of control. In any given moment he could cry, could shout, could gibber like a maniac.

"You’ll feel differently after you make Inspector," Robbie told him then.

"Maybe you can focus on something other than murders," Laura told him.

"James. I’ll accept your resignation if you still feel the same way after you take some time," Jean tells him now.

He sees she respects him for sorting himself. He's far from the dutiful young sergeant she assigned to a former inspector returning from secondment. Her expression is compassionate and kind.

Her understanding, more than anything, is like a knife, cutting him loose from all support.

He gives a curt nod as he takes the letter and meets her eyes. "Right, then. I'll take the time to take a walk."

**Oxford—Present**

"You said you stopped at the next to last village." Robbie sips his orange juice, eyes briefly meeting his own and then darting away.

"The last city before Santiago is Pedrouzo, also called Arca. I stopped in Arzua, where the Caminos meet, just before Pedrouzo." James stubs out his cigarette and then folds his hands on the table. "That's where I was arrested for murder."

Robbie’s eyes widen. "You’re joking. Give over, man."

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

In the days following the incident at the allotment, James talks with Laura and Jean Innocent.

But he doesn't talk with Robbie.

He's afraid. He's never been truly afraid before. He facetiously confesses to being afraid of spiders and Innocent's wrath, but he is genuinely afraid of how he might react around Robbie now. In his present state he might grab and kiss the man—he has no idea how this "passion" thing works for him.

And from what he's read, he needs to be on guard. Even though now the feeling of desire is less a simmer and more of a fizzle, sputtering in and out of existence, like a cigarette lighter that won't hold a flame. Perhaps it will go out entirely if he can let it go.

He recalls a killer saying: "Passion is something that only happens to other people in life, in books, in paintings, but never to me."

_Yep._

He gathers his new camping gear—cringing at the expense—shoves a few things into his rucksack, and gets ready to leave everything behind.

His career, his life. His feelings of guilt and shame and self-pity.

He hopes to go to confession before he leaves. He can't forgive himself, he believes, until he seeks forgiveness. He arrives at the advertised time to find a few parishioners waiting before Mass. He prefers the individual feel of the private confessional for absolution and assignment of penance as opposed to the group experience of being forgiven.

He is afraid he might cry. He has spent the past week drinking heavily—emotional control is fleeting at best.

As he kneels, he notices a family accompanying an older woman. The bums of the children rest against the pew behind them as they kneel. He is almost relieved when the older woman hisses at them to straighten up because he has a horrible urge to do the same.

As if God won't listen if they aren't kneeling properly or folding their hands just so.

James straightens reflexively.

An elderly priest bustles into the sanctuary. Most older priests would have swept into the confessional to maintain the illusion of anonymity. This priest addresses them all. "Father Joseph is ill. I know he’d appreciate your prayers."

"It’s nothing serious, I hope," says a woman of a certain age, standing to queue for confession.

"An allergic reaction to oxyacylic acid." The old priest says in a tremulous voice.

"Someone gave him spinach? But everyone knows he’s highly allergic."

"No, no. Not spinach. He was working in the rectory garden without gloves. It was an invasive weed of some kind full of oxyacylic acid. Japanese knotweed."

James's confession is the last one to be heard. The air in the confessional is stale, scented with perfume, foot powder, and dust.

"Bless me, Father," he begins. And then he is unable to go on. His chest is too tight. He chews on the inside of his cheek till he tastes blood.

The priest waits silently.

James's nose fills. He breathes through his mouth, too loud in the confined space. He shifts to take a handkerchief from his pocket. The kneeler creaks alarmingly.

"Don't go," says the priest. "Take your time."

James apologizes, blows his nose. Tries to speak. He swallows audibly, huffs, sniffs, gulps. Swears under his breath for not being in control.

"Do you have Tourette's, my son?"

James barks a laugh. "No, Father. Sorry for laughing. It was an unexpected comment."

"Do you often know what people are going to say before they say it, young man? Do you know what people are going to do before they do it? Isn't that a bit presumptuous of you?"

 _Oh, not good. Not good at all._ The old priest isn't going to allow him to wallow. "I should."

"Why?"

"Father, it's my job to figure things out." He bites out the words, bitter and angry at himself. "I should have known what he might do." Hot tears burn his eyes. "Technically, I know it's not my fault—I do know that—so I couldn't know what he'd think, what he'd do. But I used to anticipate the consequences of my actions—I was bloody good at knowing when and how far to push for answers—I knew what to ask and when to stand down and, oh, I prided myself on it. I was good at my job and I cared, Father. I did."

"I'm listening."

"I was angry at him—I thought he was impeding the investigation of a man's murder. I shouted at him. Then he took his life. I found him. He was a student." James inhales sharply, gathering his resolve to confide it all because someone, finally, is listening. His whisper is quiet and strained, trying to keep these disclosures within the confines of this tiny box.

"I don't think it would have affected me so much, Father, except that there have been so many over the years. He only a few years younger—" He wipes tears away with his fingertips, "—than an old friend who came to me for advice when I was in seminary before I became a police officer."

James hears a creak behind the lattice, as if the priest has leaned closer to listen more intently.

"I shouted at my friend, too. He listened to my counsel, and I was so sure, Father, so bloody certain that I was doing the right thing, saying the right thing. Made damn sure he listened to me so that he'd ruin his life and in doing so—God, I think sometimes I ruined my own. And now I don't know what's right any longer. I can't feel anything for the people I'm supposed to serve. I feel too much for a man I can never have. And I've fallen so short of the glory of God. I feel so far from God, Father." James is crying so hard he isn't aware that the old priest has opened the door to his side of the confessional.

"Tea, I think," the old priest says, putting his hand on James's shoulder. "We'll take a little walk."

James's formal confession—though not his need for it—is forgotten.

**Spain—Camino Frances—Villafranca—Triacastela—Past**

The wind ruffling through the heavy leaves in the trees sounds like applause as James walks up into Galicia. The tangled tree branches form an arch high overhead, dappled sunlight barely reaching the Way. Stone bridges on the dirt path cross streams spilling over grey boulders. _O país dos mil ríos_ —country of a thousand rivers—the trickle and rushing sound of water is constant.

Near O Cebrecio a slate placed on the road reads: "Let everything happen to you, beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final. – Rilke. _Ultrya!_ (Keep on!)"

It feels as if he is walking back in time. There's old magic here, talk of witches— _meigras_ —and enchanted forests. The mountains are a lush Northern European green, a patchwork of lime and kelly green with copses of chestnut trees and mounds of white rocks dotting the rolling hills. The Camino goes up, goes down.

It messes with the mind.

In Navarra, the stone houses had appeared well-cared for with bright edging around the windows and decorative stones on the corners, neat inside and out. Pleasant, practical. In Leon and Castile most of the houses had been brown, smooth adobe clustered together, with homey details inside, tended gardens outside. Comfortable, warm.

The houses of Navarra made him think of Laura, the houses of Leon reminded him of Robbie.

Here the houses are ancient, enchanted, haphazard; cobbled together of pretty rocks, but not structured. Wild, strange, beautiful. Constructed of layered and weirdly shaped stones overgrown with dripping vines, knotweed, moss, and tiny flowers of yellow and lavender. These unfortunate houses remind him of himself for some reason. It's the way they sit against hillocks and lean against trees, sprawled or hunched, trying to be comfortable in the landscape without quite fitting in.

He recalls reading about this area in _The Pilgrimage._ Recalls stories of strange dogs and odd people testing the pilgrims resolve now that they are rebuilding themselves to meet their new selves between Santiago and Finisterre.

Time is measured differently here: pilgrims experience the exhilaration of knowing that their journey is almost complete and yet they can't seem to move quickly. It's as if the earth holds them back here with roots and tendrils.

The forest is deep, with chestnut trees over-run by eucalyptus. For weeks, he has craved cooler temperatures. Now, he shudders in the cold. Shrouded in mist, white, thin tree trunks are ghostlike grey bones in contrast to dark thick tree trunks that hunker into the earth. The shedding leaves and bark of the Australian trees lends a sharp tang to the air, mixing with the smell of damp earth and the heavy scent of pigs and cow dung.

Or maybe that's him. He's certainly contributing to the area's odors, at least going by the expression on the _hospitalero_ 's face at the _albergue_.

"My name is Hathaway. Did someone leave a letter for me?" He's slightly out of breath, having made good time on the Way.

The _hospitalero_ wrinkles her nose. "You. You must wash."

James purses his lips. "Hathaway. Is there a letter, please?"

The woman frowns, nods. "But for more, you must wash."

He grins, and then his smile falters, uncertain. Maybe he doesn't want a letter.

The _hospitalero_ sets out stacks of plates. "Wash. You help. I tell you more." She shrugs.

"You read the letter?"

"Yes. She knows. I learn English. Go."

James shivers through a cold shower and then helps in the kitchen, welcoming the warmth of the stove as he cuts potatoes for _tortilla de patata._ The letter—it was more of a note, really-- was written on the back of a small flyer for La Chaise-Dieu Festival de Musique to be held in Auvergne, France. Anna asks him in clear printing to meet her there in a week. There's an email address—gmail—no other information.

"She meets you there," says the woman in English. The _hospitalero_ reads over his shoulder, adding, in Spanish, "She said you'll want a computer to send an email, but we don't have one at this _albergue_ —" She smiles at him. "Am I speaking too quickly?"

He nods, humbly, lips compressing a small smile.

"You must learn to listen faster," says the woman in Spanish, turning to the stove.

 _A religious music festival. Does Anna play an instrument? Does she sing? Is she a music historian?_ He knows so little about her. Doesn't know if he wants to meet her again, isn't sure he wants to pursue whatever this is between them. Friendship, he supposes. It was kind of her to write a game for him—lovely, actually. He smiles, remembering.

He just wanted her email address because he wanted to explain—what? That he isn't interested in pursuing anything with her because he loves someone else? _Oh, sure, that would go over well._ And if that's the case, why not call her? Why bother being so polite about a casual encounter?

_People have them all the time, don't they? But I don't. She said she doesn't either._

So why is he standing here clutching a flier, scowling, and wondering what to do? He glances up, huffing a sigh.

The _hospitalero_ is watching him with an expression that reminds him inexplicably of Jean Innocent. Faint exasperation mixed with tolerance and a small amount of appreciation for doing good work. He did a good job cubing potatoes.

"I tell you what she said," she says in English. "Number one. You explain why you take the blame."

 _I feel inexplicably guilty for every bloody fucking thing,_ he thinks sourly. It takes a moment for him to realize this is not what she's asking. He's only aware of his frown when he stops frowning. And then he realizes: he doesn't feel as guilty as he did when he left Oxford.

He nods, encouraging her to go on.

"In English, why do you—" She stops, mimed cutting her hand with his knife. "I say, in Spanish, the knife is bad, it cuts me."

James smiles, congratulating himself for not confessing to a crime other than speaking English. He drops the knife and says, clearly, in English, "I drop the knife."

"The knife fell for you," corrected the _hospitalero_.

They exchange grammar lessons until she is satisfied, and then she tells him what she observed about Anna. In English, she tells him, because it is good to practice things you do not know even if you do not enjoy doing it.

"She said your smile is nice, but you are sad. You are a good man. Quiet. She said your things are taken. You helped the old German who was dead. Reading pleased you." The woman thinks for a moment. "She said you are a spy."

James smirks at her. "Wouldn't do if too many people knew."

Her eyes widen. But she gets the joke, turning away smiling. "She thinks you are a teacher."

"Is she a teacher?"

" _Si._ Small children." She holds her hand at her waist.

 _That would explain her kindness,_ he thinks. _Certainly wept like a child._ He wonders why she told him she worked in an office.

Of course, he wasn't telling the whole truth either since he said the same thing.

Or maybe he wasn't really listening. He might have paid more attention if he had known she was a teacher. So perhaps that's why she said she worked in an office: she didn't want to talk about her job at all.

"She said you please her," the woman continues.

In Spanish, there is no equivalent for "like." If you like carrots, they please you, he thinks, carefully folding the flier and putting it in his pocket. It's an interesting semantic distinction, nothing more, but he smiles slightly, biting the inside of his lip in a little smile.

It is good to know that he pleases a teacher.

 


	14. Chapter 14

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

It's a stretch of the legs to get to the bus station from the church. He is surprised, then, to see Robbie Lewis standing outside the church, leaning against his car, arms folded. Scowling.

James adjusts his pack and crosses the street. No reason to delay the inevitable.

"You left your guitar with Laura?" Robbie says.

This is not what he expects. He expects to be taken to task for leaving without a word.

Except they are now having words. Just not—

"She has an alarm system," James says. He can't say that he didn't want to see Robbie, that he was afraid of what he might do. He's almost glad Lewis is angry. It makes it easier somehow. "You weren't home when I needed to leave."

Robbie nods. His face is stony. "Awful sudden."

James sighs. "I'm going to miss my bus."

"Get in." Robbie gets into the car, waits while James puts his gear in the back.

"Cheers," says James, quietly, waiting to be taken to task.

"All right with you if I take your guitar from Laura's back to mine?"

"Planning on selling it while I'm gone?"

"Making sure you come back."

James's heart swells as if he hears two words that are unspoken: to me. _Making sure you come back to me._ He glances at Robbie, and sees that he is right. The corner of his mouth quirks up.

 _But it can never be what I want._ Whatever hope that has taken root in his heart can never grow, never flower, never be more than what it is right now: a good friend caring enough to say goodbye, farewell, have a nice trip.

_Come back to me._

He knows that Robbie knew he was planning on leaving without saying a word. Knows that Robbie had taken the time to figure out where he was, when he'd be leaving.

_The man's a bloody good detective._

Robbie shoots him a look, making a turn into the car park at the bus station. "Can't believe you were going to leave without a word," he mutters, getting out of the car. He glances at his watch.

James nods, knowing there isn't much time. A queue is forming to board the bus. He takes his rucksack from the back, puts a twisted strap on one shoulder. "I was hoping to make a clean getaway."

"You're not a criminal, James." Robbie's voice is serious. He untwists the strap and rubs James's arm.

 _Your eyes remind me of the sky,_ James thinks. _Celestial blue._ "Forgive me," he says, a little sarky.

"Don't know as you've sinned," says Robbie. He clasps James's shoulder and pulls him into a half-hug, a man hug. Awkward because of the rucksack, the location, the time. Who they are. And though it is brief, it lasts a fraction longer than a conventional embrace. Acknowledging the bond, but not dwelling on it. Robbie claps him on the back.

No other words are said. None are needed. James smiles, Robbie smiles. James imagines a conversation of empty promises: _I'll send a postcard. You'd better. And of course I'll call from the road. Let me know when you get to Burgos. I'll think of you when my feet give out. Yeah, you'd be wanting me to carry you like always. Would you carry me? Always._

Wonders if promises were made in threes, would they come true?

Robbie raises an eyebrow at the station, raps his hand against the roof of his car, opens his door. Waiting.

James turns to the station, congratulating himself on not grabbing Robbie and hanging on. Not wanting to see the man drive away.

Because he senses there is more going on here than friendship, more than the paternal act of straightening a rucksack strap, more than a mate's brusque rub of his arm. It's the look in Robbie's eyes—as if he still doesn't understand why James is leaving. Soft, sad, with too much unspoken and it's awful because James has to leave.

Because he doesn't understand either.

_I have to know if I can live with loving you and possibly wanting you without ever having you. I have to know if what I felt between us that day at the allotment was a one-off or something that will give Laura cause to worry. I need to know._

Next to the loading area is a gully of bramble and weeds. A section is taped off with a sign warning of chemical treatment for Japanese Knotweed.

James suspects that more than chemicals will be needed to get rid of the roots.

**Spain—Camino Frances—Arzua—Past**

Arzua is the town where the Camino del Norte and the Camino Frances meet. It was rebuilt in the 1950’s with that era's institutional architecture. It's a small boring city with little of note. Hundreds of pilgrims are in a long queue to have their _credencial_ stamped. James doesn't need to wait. And when he gets to Santiago, he won't have to wait in line for a _compostela_ , either.

Santiago is known for silversmiths and he's thinking of buying earrings for Jean Innocent since he purchased something for Laura earlier on the Way.

And he's given a lot of thought to what he wants to buy for Robbie.

Santiago is also known for carving and there are beautiful chess sets of carved jet and alabaster that he wouldn't dream of buying for himself. But if he bought one for Robbie, he'd be able to spend time with the man playing the game. He imagines it would take years to teach Robbie to play a good game of chess. Especially if he turns out to be a poor instructor.

 _As long as Robbie doesn’t catch on that I'm deliberately holding him back._ He thinks of Laura curled up with a book, reading on the couch, while he and Robbie play chess. _Three friends growing old together._

_Laura will see through my scheme completely, but she said I'd be welcome. Maybe she'll understand and approve as long as I'm not underfoot too often. He'll see through it, too, most likely. But we won't talk about it. Allotment on Sundays, Friday evenings at the pub, pensioner lunch on Tuesdays, and maybe chess lessons every Monday or Thursday whenever Laura has orchestra rehearsal. Maybe I could cook for all of us on those evenings, help out. Maybe I should see if I can find a paella pan while I'm in Santiago._

_Bloody hell, maybe I should stop rearranging Robbie's life to accommodate me. He can't be missing me as much as I am missing him. He has Laura, after all. And I have no right to be thinking of stocking their kitchen with cookware._

_I don't even know if he likes chess. He may even play chess—we've never really talked about it._

James goes from one _albergue_ to the next, seeking lodging. A large group of student pilgrims descended on the town the night before, he’s told.

He finds a room in an old stone hotel. A room to himself. It's a treat after sleeping in the rough for the last few days. The interior walls have been remodeled and remodeled—each room is tiny. One wall is covered in wallpaper with a repeating pattern of scallops, as if one could forget one is on the Camino. The mattress is uncomfortably soft and lumpy, so instead of sleep, he goes to the plaza. Stops at a bar for a glass of wine and tapas. He purchases more gauze to cover the healing tattoos, antibiotic ointment, buys some aspirin. He drops off his laundry there, dons the cassock.

Wearing the cassock allows him to blend in. So common are priests in town that he is one of many. It is a comfort. He’s always stood out: his height, his intelligence. The unfortunate shape of his face. He has learned to stand with his legs spread so that he doesn’t intimidate others with his height. In a cassock, no one notices his odd, anchoring stance. He is simply another priest. He is treated to warm smiles of acceptance wherever he goes. He melts into his role, savoring the sweetness of being benign and good.

He's planning to rush to Santiago, to see if he can catch Anna before she leaves for France. He has phoned and emailed without an answer, but he has faith now.

It's a lesson from the Camino: God provides what is needed most. If he needs to see Anna again in person, it will happen somehow.

After walking alone for days, he’s in the midst of others again. As if his journey had started over. There are the zealots, the tourists, the New Age pilgrims. He is wondering if he will be treated again to the screams of seedlings seeking the sun and he smiles, tolerantly, wondering if he should try it.

And then he hears a real scream—of fear and discovery—just inside his hotel.

He runs inside. He follows the others rushing up the stairs, pushing them aside in his haste to help.

A woman stands in the hallway. The door to his room is open. A man on the floor blocks the doorway, a smear of blood beneath him, marking a path crawled from inside the room. On his hands are purple gloves. A camping knife is sticking out from his carotid artery.

James's knife.

Another man kneels, fingertips on the victim’s neck. His eyebrows shoot up in surprise. The man on the floor is still alive.

People crowd forward, someone calls the police, an ambulance.

Everyone turns to look at James.

 _Of course._ He’s wearing the cassock. His hiking clothes are in town being washed.

They look at him expectantly. _Last rites._

He sighs. He knows the ritual. _How long has it been? Two months?_ He had said the words to himself while supporting Adam Tibbitt’s body.

He kneels beside the bleeding man, and he knows him. He says the words first, there is so little time to prepare this man to meet God.

This is the man who stole his phone at the beginning of the journey under a sky filled with the supermoon.

When he finishes, James meets the man’s eyes. His voice is quiet. "Who did this?"

"You," says the man as he dies.

James prays for a minute, then two. For the man. For himself. Then he gently shuts the open, lifeless eyes.

A woman starts to enter James's room.

"No. It’s a crime scene," says James, in the cassock, as he rises. People listen to him, back away.

This uniform—the cassock--gives him authority. Or maybe they believe he is the killer. The man was in his room, after all, stabbed with his knife.

Unwarranted guilt settles on his shoulders like a well-worn cloak. Of course the knife sticking from the man's throat must be his fault.

He takes a deep breath. _No, it isn't. Of course not._

He recognizes one of the women standing in the hallway. Their eyes meet. She looks away, but does not leave the scene. James knows she has something she will tell the police.

She used his knife in the _albergue_ when he said he'd like to get his hands on the man who stole his iPhone.

She heard his remark about where to position a knife to cut a man's throat.

This scenario could be a textbook lesson in personal incrimination, he realizes. Except that he did not kill this man.

_It's not my fault. But it doesn't abrogate my responsibility._

He stands guard over the body, the room. For a small town, it is taking an age for the police to arrive.

He starts questioning the people standing around. Starts to take charge. It feels like putting on a comfortable shoe, stepping back into this role.

"What are you, some kind of cop?" asks an American. "Some kind of Father Brown wannabe?"

"He’s impersonating a priest," says the woman in the hallway.

Apparently that is the greatest crime of all.

The police arrive. He is told in slow English that he is being detained for questioning. His things are confiscated. An interpreter will meet them at the station. The victim is known to be a thief who preys on the pilgrims each season. Hathaway’s mobile phone is among many retrieved from the victim’s room.

It is his knife. So he is arrested and charged.

It is a new experience, being unjustly accused, being on the other side of the law.

Besides the dying man’s last words, particularly damning is the statement of the woman in the hallway, who "saw the whole thing" in the meadow. Who heard him plan the murder in the _albergue_.

"Has her room been searched?" Hathaway asks stoically. "Look for wallets, mobile phones. Look for drugs."

She has committed no crime, the police insist. She is a witness, the police say. Who are you to tell us our job?

Call my boss, Hathaway says. Jean Innocent, Chief Superintendent, Oxfordshire Police.

 


	15. Chapter 15

**_Fallopia japonica_ Notebook**

**_… In this study, we investigated how hybridization, adaptive evolution, and/or phenotypic plasticity may have contributed to increased salt tolerance in one of the world’s most invasive plants. —Plasticity in salt tolerance traits allows for invasion of novel habitat by Japanese knotweed ( _Fallopia japonica_ ), American Journal of Botany, Richards, et al, 2008._ **

**_"Cried me a river of tears, that's the truth. Japanese Knotweed destroyed my marriage." —NPR Interview on KPBS-FM, September, 2013._ **

**Oxford—Present**

"And that’s how you got out of it?" Lewis has switched to a pint. "So, the woman was his accomplice."

James nods. "On the Camino, you become known by your rucksack, your hat. Sunglasses hide your eyes. People with long hair wear it up or tucked into their hats. Since you wear the same clothes day after day, someone who has a 'new' pack and 'new' clothes is 'new' to the Camino. They could never get a firm description of the suspects other than medium height, medium weight, medium everything. I'd seen the woman at least twice but didn't recognize her until the end."

"But you don't notice women anyway." Lewis' cocked his head. "Least you didn't used to."

James quirks an ironic smile. "Sounds rather accusatory."

"I just meant—"

"I know." James sips his pint to hide a grin. "The point I'm making, Robert, is that they had a good racket."

"Just the two of them?"

James sighs. _This is why I came home. Of course he sees it because the man is a good detective. Sees the problem immediately._ "No."

"There was a third man?"

James nods.

**Spain—Camino Frances—Arzua—Past**

He spends the night locked in a small cell that has more creature comforts than his last stay in an _albergue_. The bed is comfortable, clean. He's alone. _Café con leche_ and thick buttered toast arrive on a plastic tray in the morning. They say that all pilgrims arriving in Santiago get the reception they deserve. He begins to realize that he won't finish the journey. He won't join hundreds of _peregrinos_ crowding the plaza outside the Cathedral Santiago de Compostela. Won't be saddened by the new wrought-iron fence that surrounds the Tree of Jesse in the Portico de la Gloria where hundreds of thousands of pilgrims have placed their hands over the centuries.

He won't have to wait for hours to have his _credencial_ stamped and his _compostela_ issued. He is grateful beyond measure that he walked the Camino before the total "McDonaldization" of the Way. Ten years from now, the Camino will probably be the internet Anna dreamt of and the _credencial_ will be stamped electronically via GPS sites, carefully digitized to produce "an authentic experience." The _compostela_ will be awarded by a computer and sent to an implant in one's head.

He won't be kissing the foot of the stone statue of St. James or embracing it from behind—he's not sure what is allowed these days. He won't be disappointed when they don't announce him as "A man from Oxford, England walking to eradicate Japanese knotweed." Won't miss the famous Botafumeiro censer swinging from an enormous rope over the heads of the pilgrims.

He doesn't have nightmares any longer about things that swing. Doesn't have as great a problem clearing his head. His mental images of forests are less likely to contain body parts and are more likely to contain images of yellow arrows sprayed on boulders.

The "All Seeing Eye" in the center of the cathedral dome won't see him.

He puts a hand behind his head. All in all, it's a pleasant end to his walk.

With the exception of being arrested, of course.

\+ + + + 

Later that afternoon, he is escorted by a police officer to a small interview room with a tiny transom window set high in the wall. A ceiling fans squeaks above him as it rotates.

The police officer is not young and reminds him a bit too much of Peterson. The officer speaks imperiously through an interpreter who seems curiously excited by the proceedings.

"I didn't kill that man. Yes, it's my knife, so of course my fingerprints are on it." James tries to relax, tries not to think of smoking a joint that night when he was robbed— _some copper!_ —and tries not to think about Jean Innocent fielding a call from the constables in Arzua, Spain about her former detective sergeant accused of murder.

He was just trying to get away.

He huffs a frustrated laugh and gives a slight shake of his head.

The police officer frowns at him. Asks if he thinks this is funny. The interpreter asks if he is making a joke.

He shakes his head.

The woman had made her statement. Had heard him and the woman from British Columbia in the _albergue_ that night, planning the murder. She had heard more than that, in fact, had banged on the wall telling him to keep it down—

James leans his head back and stares at the ceiling. _Oh, Christ._

"You think I killed a man for a mobile phone? Do you honestly think I would commit murder for that?"

"We know how you were trying to pretend to be a good man, a Godly man. Checking into monasteries. But you are not a priest. Why were you pretending to be a priest?"

"Wearing a cassock does not mean that I was pretending to be a priest! My clothes were being washed here—I wore what I had been given at Samos when I left." He leans forward, hands clasped. "I was ill. The clothes I was wearing had to be destroyed. I was given the cassock in exchange."

"Were you doing laundry because your other clothes were covered with blood? There was a young woman attacked on the Camino. We have picked up your clothes at the launderers. Your walking shorts are streaked with blood as if you wiped a knife—"

"I was cutting meat and wiped my knife—" Of course she had seen that, the woman in the _albergue_. "Have you checked her room?"

He is asked again why he didn't report the theft of his belongings. Why won't he tell the truth, why won't he tell what happened on the Camino?

"I didn't report the theft because I was embarrassed. I'm a police officer! I was incapacitated. Deserved to be robbed—" James chews the inside of his cheek, seeing he is being maneuvered into a corner, wondering if he should ask for legal representation. Wondering if they've contacted Innocent.

Wondering if he should ring Robbie. _Robbie would come._ He knows, suddenly, that Robbie would drop everything and come to help him.

_Maybe that's why I never picked up a disposal mobile along the Way. I needed to finish my journey._

The door to the small room opens. It is the man that he and Anna had met on the road, the one they referred to as the fast-talking Frenchman. He is unshaven, wearing jeans and a casual, well-worn shirt.

He is wearing a badge as well and carrying a fat evidence envelope.

He meets Hathaway's eyes as he sits down.

"You were undercover on the Camino," James says in French to the officer.

"Let's speak English, please." The Frenchman turns to the other officer. "May we have some water?"

Hathaway has used this technique before to rid the room of someone when something must be said in confidence. He didn't see cameras though as he came in—he doubts that anyone is watching. He waits in silence, as does the Frenchman, both taking the measure of the other. A minute later the other officer returns and soon James is draining a water bottle, as is the Frenchman.

"It is thirsty work, the Camino," says the French officer. "Every year we see an increase in crime as _peregrinos_ increase. Over two hundred and fifteen thousand last year leave from France. The biggest game—con game? scam?—is to rob the pilgrim at the beginning of the journey when their wallets are full and their suspicion is down. It's a religious journey—who would rob a pilgrim?"

He opens another bottle of water. "Thieves take the expensive hiking gear from Roncevalles in Spain and bring it back to St. Jean to re-sell it. They can do this several times."

James nods. He bought padded straps from such a shop. Had wished he had waited to buy his gear there as the prices were lower.

"They take mobiles and wallets. You know that Americans still use a magnetic stripe and a chip on their credit cards? Without a phone, they cannot report their cards stolen and the card number can be sold and circulated for a few days before it is reported. And there's the personal information on the mobile itself which can be invaluable."

"You searched that woman's room."

The French officer nods. "And it is as you suspected. I have a few more questions. Why didn't you report the theft of your belongings?"

 _Because I had a single toke of cannabis, which was illegal, I was stupid, and I passed out from too much wine,_ he thinks. Realization dawns. James would have continued to feel the effects the next morning if the marijuana had been laced with hashish or methamphetamine. "I drank the wine they were passing around. Do they drug the wine they give their victims?"

"A cocktail of benzodiazepines and GHB—date rape drugs. Why were you walking with the woman from British Columbia?"

"I met her on the Camino." James shrugs. "We seemed to get along."

The Frenchman smiles and looks away until the smile fades. "They only heard her. Through the wall that night in the hotel. From the word on the Camino, they learned that the tall blond Englishman was walking with a woman from British Columbia." He folds his hands. "They attacked a different Canadian woman, thinking she was with you."

 _No. So it was true, it wasn't just Camino gossip. Dear God, not more blood on my hands—no, no, can't start thinking that it is my fault without knowing more._ "Why? What happened? How bad--"

"A few more questions, please. You went to a number of monasteries."

"Yes."

"Yet you were not on a religious pilgrimage. You were not consistent in maintaining your _credencial_."

"I was on holiday. It was an opportunity for spiritual growth, a change of scenery. I walked the Camino in 2000." James doesn't add that he walked as a postulant.

The French drums his fingers on the fat envelope. "Why did you have a cassock in your possession if you are not a priest?"

James sighs. "As I told the other officer, I had one change of clothing when I left Samos. They had to get rid of my other clothes because—" He sighs, then admits, "I had terrible diarrhea. They gave me the cassock to wear because my other change of clothes was still wet from being washed when I left. That's why I had the cassock to begin with. The reason why I was wearing it today was because everything I owned was being washed."

"You were in a hurry."

James purses his lips and hangs his head. It sounds ridiculous, trying to make up for lost time now. "I had been detained at Samos. I was hoping to catch up with my Canadian friend." He rolls his eyes heavenward, as if it is obvious. But it isn't, not even to him. He's not even sure what he would say or do, really, if he caught up with Anna.

The Frenchman gives a little smile. "Word on the Camino was, variously, that you were a British nobleman and an agent with MI6. Can you explain?"

"I heard that I was an angel, too," James quips, immediately regretting it. "Things get distorted on the Camino."

"But you don't deny that at Azqueta you told the woman at the hotel just now how to open an artery."

"No, I don't deny it. There were plenty of witnesses. Though obviously I wouldn't have told her if I thought she was going to use the information." James looks at the envelope. _They must know I didn't kill the man. They have to be toying with me now._ The Frenchman is getting back some of his own, putting him in his place. _Well, I deserve it. I've been supercilious, sarcastic._ He remains silent.

"You think too much," the officer observes. "We know the woman killed the man in the hall. Her fingerprints were not on the knife, but yours were smeared as if someone had worn gloves. We discovered gloves in her room. Among other things. And you were seen in the plaza, you were seen running up the stairs. You were noticed. The cassock is a bit too short for you. People are too polite to tell you that you look a little strange." He folds his hands. "But you performed last rites."

James worries his thumb nail, notices, and drops his hands in his lap. "I was in the seminary for a year."

The Frenchman nods as if he knew this all along.

 _Bastard,_ James thinks without rancor, glancing at the table.

Opening the envelope, the Frenchman slides out seven iPhones. James sees his, but doesn't reach for it. And he sees another: a new iPhone with a blue waterproof case. His stomach clenches.

"Which one is yours?"

James points. "And I know this one. It belongs to my friend, Anna." _She must have been robbed after we spoke. She might even still be in Santiago._

"Ask your questions."

"Please tell me what happened to the woman attacked on the Camino. Will she recover? And what is her name?"

"This is the first question you ask?"

"It's the most important, don't you think?" _That someone might have been injured because of something I did or said. That someone has been murdered using my knife. Yeah, I want to know._

The French cop nods, his face softening. "Her name is Renee. She will recover. She was shoved, slapped across the face, her things were taken. She was not raped or restrained in any way. Or poisoned. Or killed. Sometimes what one hears on the Camino is not accurate."

"Thank God." James takes a moment to send up a small prayer of thanks even before he's aware that he's doing so. "Did the woman in the hallway confess?" He's getting tired of referring to everyone as 'the woman' or 'that man.' He'd like some names, but he's not in a position to ask.

One does not ask for names on the Camino.

The scream James had heard was hers. He is certain of it.

"She has retained counsel, but yes, she has told us what happened. The man killed in the hall outside your room was known to us. He and the woman who accused you were working the Camino all season long. What we didn't know was that there was a third man. The man and the woman traveled as a couple, drugging and robbing their victims. The third man would take the stolen goods back into France by car. They would switch partners—the woman was the constant, going with one man or the other."

"So they were business partners?"

"More. The three of them were lovers and had been so for some time. But there were two problems. The first was that the two men had begun to realize that they only wanted each other. And the second was that they suspected that their operation was going to be taken over by you and your Canadian friend."

"What?"

"They had heard things along the Camino. Your altered identity, your expensive gear, your romantic prowess."

James rolls his eyes. _Thank God they didn't hear me crying like a baby._ "Why would they think that? And why were they in my room? They got everything I owned. I was running out to do laundry in a borrowed—" And then it hits him.

"It was the cassock, yes. When the woman saw what she thought was a disguise, she wanted to go back to your room. They'd been following you along the Camino, you see, because of something they took from you. You had in your possession something quite valuable to them. They assumed it was stolen. They assumed that their operation was now going to have competition. That it was in jeopardy. And so the man told the woman this would be his last Camino. He would go into your room, Mr. Hathaway, and take whatever else you had taken from others, and then he was leaving with the other man who had become his lover. He no longer wanted her."

"So she stabbed him." James remembers hearing her scream.

 _It sounded nothing like a seedling seeking the sun,_ he thinks.

The Frenchman shrugs one shoulder. "She didn't think he would bleed so quickly, that the knife was so sharp. She went to her room to pack, heard your door open. She went into the hall. She screamed, seeing the man she once loved in a pool of blood. And then she thought she could put the blame on you, you see. As I said, she believed that the object of value you had was stolen."

James stares at him. "What could I possibly have had that was that valuable?"

The Frenchman reaches into the envelope and pulls out James's warrant card and sets it on the table. "You probably didn't even know you had packed it. At first they must have thought it was a normal wallet. To have stolen it would be an accomplishment, they thought. The mark of a master criminal. They didn't know you were actually a police officer."

James reaches for the badge and opens it. _Detective Sergeant James Hathaway. It really should read Detective Inspector James Hathaway. I should go back to my job, my life in Oxford. Robbie and Laura. Jean. I could take the Inspector exam. It should say Detective Inspector James Hathaway. It should. I like being a detective. Like following clues, solving puzzles. Detective Inspector James Hathaway. Yes. Perhaps it will._

He closes it thoughtfully and taps it against his lips. _No idea I had it. Thought I'd left it behind. Thought I'd left everything behind._ "Thank you."

The Frenchman nods. "You may check your mobile, though we will need to retain it as evidence for a short while longer. A Detective Inspector Lewis has been trying to reach you. For weeks, it looks like. As has your Chief Superintendent. Are you quite important to the Oxfordshire force?"

"I didn't think so," James admits with a bemused smile.

 


	16. Chapter 16

**Oxford—Past—Before the Camino**

James's rucksack is stowed with the other passenger luggage in the compartment beneath the dark blue airport bus. The interior of the bus smells of antiseptic and stale air conditioning. The day is warm, the arm rest is sticky, and there are tiny fingerprints smudging the inside of his window. James stares out the window, seeing Robbie's car still in the car park.

Robbie is leaning on his car, watching James, hands in his pockets, looking for all the world as if he has lost his best friend.

 _Has he?_ James wonders. _He has Laura, though. Lyn. What am I to him except a former sergeant? What can I be to him now?_

As the bus slowly passes Robbie, James makes eye contact, feeling that tug he always does when he looks at the man. He wonders again if he is doing the right thing by leaving.

Robbie's shoulders heave as if he is sighing, and he gives the ghost of a smile, his face pained as if he doesn't understand what is happening.

_I don't understand either._

_I left my guitar—he knows I'm coming back. He has to know I'm coming back._

_Doesn't he?_

James turns in his seat to eye the car park as they leave. Robbie is still watching the bus. Finally, as the bus rounds the corner, James sees Robbie slowly get into his car.

_What have I done?_

**Oxford—Present**

"That’s why you didn’t make it to the cathedral." Robbie pushes his glass aside. "Jean never mentioned a word."

James acknowledges this with a slight nod. "I realized, while I was the guest of the Galician constabulary, that I had an excellent boss. That I had had an excellent mentor." James toys with his cigarette, inhaling deeply. "I realized I enjoy police work. I said I’d stopped believing that people were good, Robbie." He leans forward, his head tilted, fingers laced together. "What I meant was that I wasn’t good." He stares at the table. "I realized I was losing my compassion. I pushed for answers. I stopped doing what I do best."

Robbie frowns. "But you always gave your best, man."

James meets Robbie’s eyes. "I stopped listening. You remember Adam's girlfriend, Rachel? Her mother said we weren't listening, that we never listen. She was right. I stopped listening to suspects, witnesses. Everyone. Including you." He doesn't say he stopped listening to God—doesn't need to. He can see understanding in Robbie's eyes.

"I think it was fortuitous that Laura gave me _Don Quixote_ ," James says. "I needed to read it again. I needed to be humbled."

"Reading a book in Spanish when you're not fluent will do that to a person, I'm told. Laura thought you were being daft to take it, just so you know." Robbie looks away. "We missed you."

"You were with me every step of the Way," James says. "Couldn't seem to get rid of you." He smiles gently.

"Not finishing talking with you yet, that's why."

"Think I've got a lot to learn yet?"

"Aye, I do." Robbie settles his elbows on the table. "You need someone to look out for you. You lost everything, man!"

James nods. Lost his belongings, his dignity. Lost his need for isolation, too. Gained a clear head and regained a tenuous relationship with God, though.

"But I didn't lose you."

Robbie meets his eyes. Stills.

The moment grows, tendrils curling around James's heart, roots so strong they move stone and crack the hardest façade.

"It's like bloody knotweed, working its way into a garden. You think you've got it under control, trimmed it up, but it's…" James shakes his head. "I'm sorry." He takes a deep breath. "You remember the allotment."

Robbie's eyebrows go up.

"I didn't know what to do." James's voice is a whisper. Stops. _I've spent days rehearsing this very moment. Every step of the way I thought, here's how I'll explain and now I can't recall a single word._

"Yeah, there was a moment out there," Robbie says quietly.

James nods, numb. Waiting. Knowing that Robbie is certainly fond of him, won't deliberately hurt him by ridiculing what he's about to say. But he knows that there was more than affection in that moment. There was a new awareness between them that hadn't been there before.

Robbie knows it too, though his expression is guarded, as if he's waiting for James to take the lead.

So—now that he's back in Oxford over the last few weeks—is it gone? Mostly, mostly. But there are moments, terrifying moments, when he marvels at the way Robbie's mouth moves as he smiles. _"What are all these kissings worth if thou kiss not me?" Never wondered much about that before. About anyone._ He clamps his lips together so he doesn't babble as he continues.

"I still don't know what to do about it." He pauses, gathering his thoughts. "Walking brings clarity. You focus on the Camino. Over the miles, you lose everything except the things that are vital to your existence. I've felt this—" He inhales, feeling self-conscious. "fondness for you, I guess, for years, but I thought it would be best to try to let go. For Laura. For you. Because it changed for a moment—I changed, for a moment that day—and I couldn't bear to hurt you or Laura with what that might mean. I wanted to lose you. I tried to lose you. But I couldn't."

Robbie smiles and it brightens his entire face, making his eyes shine. He opens his mouth to speak, but James rushes on—he has to get this out.

"If I—" He drops his gaze to the rough tabletop. "—if I cared for you, or even if I loved you, I wouldn't act on it because that's not who I am, Robbie. I'd never say anything. It would be pointless. And, despite the fact that you're a bloody good detective, I doubt you'd see it for what it really was. You wouldn't notice." He glances up. "If I loved you, I mean."

"Aw, right. You think I wouldn't notice? Tell you something. What about going through Cooper's things? Or putting together those masquerade photos because I thought something wasn't right? What about the time you held my hand when we pretended to be a couple at that school? Or that time you took a bullet intended for me? I think I'd bloody well notice, James. I'm not that thick."

The look in Robbie's eyes makes his heart pound and his skin tingle as if the air is charged. _Of course he knows. He's always known._

"Well, you carried me out of a fire. Least I could do is take a bullet." Relief pools at his core, growing. He hides his relief with a casual smirk.

Robbie rubs his earlobe. "Small caliber bullet."

James bites back a grin. "True. But I've provided exceptional service over the years. We're even."

"Cheeky sod." Robbie takes a deep drink of ale and sets his glass on the table with a thump, nodding to himself. "Just so you know, I'd even keep on working just to be by your side if you needed me, that is, if I truly cared." He huffs a sigh. "Bloody hell, James. I'd even read _Don Quixote_. And no, clever clogs, not in Spanish. And not the illustrated edition either."

"I should hope not. The paintings are dreadful." James's heart is soaring. "Why _Don Quixote_?"

"Thinking about you, out there in Spain." Robbie's mouth crumples in irritation, and then softens. "For a bright man, you can be bloody thick. Makes me wonder how you managed to be such a bloody good detective."

"You trained me up." James says, smug.

Robbie nudges his hand with the empty ale glass. "Listen—you're going on about listening, so listen now. First off, don't want to lose you either. Thought that you taking time might be good for me, too, to sort it all. It was, too. It surprised me, that I missed you like I did. Kept waiting for you to peek around a corner. Kept hearing your sarky commentary while watching telly."

James inhales and holds his breath, waiting.

"But I just don't understand—Anna. Why?"

James purses his lips. He makes a show of finding another cigarette— _God, I'm smoking like a chimney_ —and lights up. "Anna was my transition person."

Robbie smirks at him, as if catching him in a lie.

"We shared a bed." James swallows. "It was somewhat humiliating, actually. I needed to learn something about myself. And I think I did."

He takes a deep breath, letting it out slowly, trying to lighten this personal disclosure. He makes a forlorn face. "I needed a hug," he says, his mouth turned down in a huge self-mocking arc.

"You needed a hug?"

James shrugs. "Not like I could come up to you and say, 'I'm having trouble coping with all that's happened at work and I need to spend the night in your arms.' Bit outside the usual job parameters of a sergeant and his guv."

"You went to Spain for a hug."

"Yeah." The corner of his mouth ticks up, an apology. "Sounds idiotic when you put it like that."

"'Cause it was." Robbie looks away, as if he knows it was never that simple. His gaze settles on James and then skitters to the side as he remarks, off-handed: "Might have asked."

"Didn't think Laura would like me hanging all over you. Didn't think I could ask her for one." He taps ash from his cigarette and leans forward, his voice quiet. "Because that spark? It made me realize that I was missing something—if I loved you or anyone, that is. I would want affection and romance." He looks heavenward. "The hearts and flowers." He says in a sing-song voice, making light of something important. He meets Robbie's eyes. "I'm not comfortable with a lot of physical intimacy. Certainly not sex. But I want—" He looks away, it's a hard admission for a man to make. "Affection."

"Who doesn't?" Robbie says.

James tries again. "But that, more than anything, is what will hurt Laura. If I cared for you that way."

Robbie chuckles. "Got it all wrong, man. Hell, she's been a witness to it every day for going on eight years."

James hangs his head. _Great._ He looks up, sees Robbie's eyes dancing. "I'm sorry."

Robbie shrugs, bumps his knuckles with the glass again. "Nothing to be sorry about. She calls you my bit on the side."

"Charming." James huffs a sigh.

"Your pal Cervantes writes: 'There were no embraces, because where there is great love there is often little display of it.'"

James bit his upper lip, pretending ignorance. "Don’t recall that." _To love pure and chaste from afar. Maybe I could be stereotypically gay at that, remembering lines from a musical._

_Funny, that. Wanting a label at this point in my life as if it would solve everything._

"Well, you might have if you'd read it in English. Jumped out at me. Though maybe that's because, well, there was a musical, years ago. _Man of La Mancha._ "

James snorts a laugh, catching himself. "Never heard of it," he says, mock serious.

"Right." Robbie purses his lips. "Talk about a sign." He looks out over the river. "Morse didn't have any love in his life. He was a lonely sod." He bumps James's fist with the empty ale glass one last time before moving it to the side, as if that makes his point.

"Count myself lucky to have so much love in my life, man. Laura, my family. You." There's an impish gleam in his expression, as if he's happy to have this—at least—resolved at last.

"Bloody hell, I don't want you to turn into Morse, James. Will you be—I dunno—happy—no, content with great love? I'm not much for displays of affection, either. But a hug now and again? Shouldn't have to go to the continent for that." He nods as he appears to consider this, still not looking at James directly, as if this honesty is too much for him already.

 _Eye contact would be too revealing,_ James thinks. He watches Robbie mull over his thoughts and wishes he could see the man's eyes.

"A proper hug. Not like that half-arsed goodbye. Right git you were for not letting me say goodbye, James. Especially since I wasn't sure you'd be coming back." He huffs, mouth turned down.

"I left my guitar. Of course I was coming back."

"Small consolation, to my mind." Robbie huffs. He takes a deep breath to continue and looks up. "So. Laura says she's fine with you coming over, watching telly with us and hogging your end of the couch with me in the middle. Fine with you and me together as best mates—knew it going in, she says. Bit on the side, she says, best mates with limited benefits."

James's jaw drops. He snaps it shut, feeling the corners of his mouth curl up despite his efforts to seem stern. "I'm scandalized."

"You and me both." Robbie grins, cheeky. "Says you're just like one big cat and we need to snuggle you properly on occasion to keep you from running away. She's been worried, you know, since you got back. Haven't had much time together."

"I've been a bit busy. Work. Training up my sergeant."

"Told you to take a break now and again." Robbie leans forward. "For Lizzie's sake, at least. Poor woman needs time with her husband. Now, Laura's got it all planned out for you and me, mind." Robbie rolls his eyes, long suffering. "Friday night is Scrabble night. I'm cooking dinner."

James bites his lower lip, stubs out his cigarette. "I don't want to break Laura's heart, but—"

"Your consideration is touching," Robbie says dryly. "Fine. Oh, bought a book on chess so I can hold my own when we get around to playing."

"I thought I'd teach you."

"Rubbish. I played chess with Morse on occasion—I know the game. I'd rather play than hear you lecture."

"I'm crushed." James smiles slightly.

Robbie gives a long suffering sigh. "I know you don't think much of me as a player, but I might surprise you."

"You continually surprise me."

"For that, you can cook dinner for the three of us."

"I look forward to it."

Robbie rubs his mouth with a sigh. A gesture that tells James he wants to say something, but is holding back the words. Then Robbie drops his hand to the table, deliberately bumping knuckles against James's hand, as if reluctant to open his hand at first. Then, slowly, he does, covering James's hand with own. Squeezing it for emphasis. "Heart chooses, you said. Tell him we expect him soon for dinner, Laura said. Not done talking with you yet, I said."

And James sees that there might be magic in things spoken in threes.

Thinks of what might be.

When Robbie lets go of James's hand, it is all James can do to keep from floating away in delight.

He casts about for something to ground himself and settles on the number three.

_Three Musketeers. Chekhov's Three Sisters. Three Little Pigs. Three Stooges._

The last reference makes him smirk.

"What's on your mind?"

"Three. _The Third Man._ Three acts in a play."

"Three coins in a fountain," says Robbie, joining in. "Three wise men. Three blind mice. What was it—three little pigs?"

"Three stooges."

Robbie shakes his head slightly, continuing the game. "Three Dog Night. Richard the Third."

James huffs a laugh and taps Robbie's hand with a long finger. "I'm a bad influence on you. A band and the Bard in one go."

The two men sit quietly, then, enjoying the fading afternoon light.

James lights another cigarette, grateful Robbie is silent. His friend needs to hear these words. “Do you know what you do best, Robbie?”

“Well, it’s not cooking. Or making a canoe. Or Scrabble. Or gardening, come to that.” Robbie turns his empty glass this way and that. “Got knotweed all through the tomato plants. S'pose we’ll have to live with it, though. Don't see what all the fuss is about—it's a pretty plant if you can contain it. I think we can manage it, you and I." He rubs his jaw thoughtfully, drops his hand to his empty glass, examining it. "You know what I'm good at? Listening." He toys with the glass. "Talking, too."

James stifles a laugh, grateful to be home. Grateful, too, that he has finally made his confession to the one man who needed to hear it.

He had walked nearly 500k to make his confession to a man who had walked with him, shoulder to shoulder, for years. Robbie had walked with him, too, on the Camino, if only in his head.

And if they didn't have a name for it, didn't know what it was, couldn't classify the type or species of whatever it was that tangled them together, it didn't mean that it had to be eradicated. If Robbie could live with it, could work with him, well, then the roots might remain as long as it didn't flourish or tear up the foundations of Robbie's relationship with Laura.

“So we're agreed, then. Not going anywhere without company." Robbie’s eyes, blue as a Spanish sky, are full of fondness.

"I’ve got deep roots here." James answers. "And I don’t think I’ll ever need to walk alone again."

"Got that right." Robbie sets his elbows on the table. His voice is far-away, soft. "Ever heard of the El Camino Real? In California? Lyn's got a training conference in San Diego. Laura's going to the same one—big to-do for her, presenting a paper. Thought maybe you and I could tag along, maybe take a walk."

James chuckles. "Let's skip the walk and go to the zoo."

"Could skip the zoo and go to Disneyland." Robbie grins. "Dreamt of going there as a kid."

James smiles back. "You know what I remember from _Don Quixote_? 'To surrender dreams — this may be madness. Too much sanity may be madness — and maddest of all: to see life as it is, and not as it should be!'"

"Ah, canny lad. Thinking of what might be, that's the ticket, right there." Robbie thumps the table as he rises. "Sounds like a proper beginning to another pint. Same again?"

_Fin_

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: All Lewis characters are the property of those copyright holders--no infringement is intended, no profit is being made. Original characters, plot, and errors are mine alone.
> 
> Acknowledgments and Informal Bibliography  
> Anecdotal information about life on the Camino (2010-2012) is from a series of personal interviews as well as blogs, books, online Q and A sessions, and articles listed below.
> 
> Thanks to Steven, Phil, Jim, and Colby for conversations providing too much information about the dark side of the Camino journey. Thanks to Bri, Martha, and Leslie who took the time to answer questions on asexuality.  
> Wikipedia was used extensively (of course).  
> Blogs:  
> http://www.asexuality.org/home/  
> Invaluable resource for asexuality.  
> http://www.spainexpatblog.com/  
> Written by an American, a look at daily life in Spain.  
> http://caminobuddies.com/tips-for-pilgrims/pilgrim-credentialcredencial/  
> Resources for travel blogs: read so many I lost track.  
> http://elcaminosantiago.com/Camino-Santiago-Map-Google-Earth-Camino.htm  
> Routes, photos.  
> Books:  
> Aviva, Elyn. _Following the Milky Way : a pilgrimage on the Camino de Santiago_ (2001)  
> Clem, Jim. _El Camino de Santíago : a pictorial pilgrimage_ (2008)  
>  Clem, Jim. _Buen camino : hiking the Camino de Santiago_  
>  Coelho, Paul. _The Pilgrimage_ (1987)  
>  Kerkeling, Hape. _I'm Off Then: Losing and Finding Myself on the Camino de Santiago_ (2009)  
>  Ramis, Sergi. _Camino de Santiago : the ancient Way of Saint James pilgrimage route from the French Pyrenees to Santiago de Compostela_ (2014)  
>  Video:  
> Discoveries--Spain. Pilgrim route. Produced by Bennett-Watt HD Productions. (2003)  
> Las Peregrinas...the Women Who Walk. (2006)  
> The way. Produced by David Alexnian, Emilio Estevez, Julio Fernández ; written and directed by Emilio Estevez. (2012)  
> Walking The Camino: Six Ways To Santiago. (2014)  
> Wayfaring - A Jaunt along the Camino de Santiago. (2014)  
> Music:  
> The chants of Camino de Santiago by Ensemble Amadis. (2001)
> 
> When I started this story in October 2014, there wasn't a lot of material out there. Now there is. If you are planning to walk, you will have lots of company.
> 
>  
> 
> **Note: There is a fun sequel to this story that will be posted very soon.**


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